SCCPSS Board Talks Budget: More Cuts Coming

The Savannah-Chatham County school board is hearing from Larry Jackson, the director of budgeting, about district work on next school year's budget.

Of course, in these tough economic times, state funding cuts and less tax money coming in, mean more cuts.

85% of the school district's costs are salaries. Susu Cox, district 1 board member, says they will not be saving money on diesel fuel or heating and air conditioning, but we have to look at salaries. Cox and other board members don't want the classrooms to be affected. Cox hopes the staff will look at the areas of least impact as they move through the budget process. She doesn't want the teaching staff to be reduced.

Cox doesn't want to increase the millage rate. She says the district needs to communicate with the tax assessors office to see what could be coming in. (She's brought this up during prior discussions)

Lori Brady, who represents district 6, has been a real estate professional for the past 12 years. She says that the market has not hit rock bottom yet and that it will be catastrophic. She says they have to be able to educate the children and that when it comes to needing more money, if they have to raise the millage rate, it's the Georgia legislature's fault for making so many cuts. Brady says folks need to be contacting their legislators now.

Superintendent, Dr. Thomas Lockamy says as they continue to look at the budget, he will look at every category and where they can balance the cirriculum and offer an across the board education, not just one population of teachers, like art or music teachers.

The district is not required to keep locally funded teachers. 20-30% of the teachers in Savannah-Chatham County are funded by the district. The locally funded teachers include some specialty programs teachers, art, music and physical education teachers. Jackson says the district has earned a number of regular classroom teachers from the state, however, they're funded at the local level.

Cox says she would rather keep teachers than eliminate positions so they can fund raises for those up for raises.

Jackson says it's their intention to keep the elementary and middle school class sizes, which already have 2 additional students. Dr. Joe Buck, board president, says he wants to see research on how adding additional students at different grade levels affects students and that they can make adjustments that way.

They will have to increase the employer contribution to retirement. They haven't addressed school buses in the past 2-3 years and Jackson says they really need to address that this year, as well as new text books. The City of Savannah has recommended eliminating crossing guards from their budget, which means the district will have to pick up the tab.

Jackie Chavis, chief academic officer, says the district is up for new math cirriculum books and that they continue to

Jackson says the board also needs to look at start-up costs for new schools and information implementation costs for the passport to excellence program.

District 4's Greg Sapp says people need to realize that the school board is not trying to balance the budget on the backs of teachers.

Floyd Adams of district 1 says the board needs to keep an open mind and look at all areas they can cut.