The DeKalb County School District still doesn't have a budget after a tense and accusatory meeting Wednesday of the county school board.
Deliberations on the budget for the fiscal year starting July 1 ground to a halt after a board member made a proposal that stunned some of his colleagues and highlighted just how difficult the financial situation is: Paul Womack wants to cut an additional 10 days from the school calendar.
In approving a tentative general fund budget, the board had already voted to reduce the school calendar for students by two days. Four furlough days approved for teachers in prior years would also remain, but they would not affect students.
Officials said it costs the system $3 million a day to operate, so the proposal could save $30 million -- enough to balance the budget without a tax increase. But they needed time to check on the details, so the budget deliberations were postponed until 6 p.m. Thursday.
But Lisa Morgan, a teacher and representative of the advocacy group Organization of DeKalb Educators, said Womack's proposal wouldn't save as much as he thinks. Womack wants to make up the lost school days by lengthening the rest of them. Another county in Georgia tried that several years ago, Morgan said.
"Because teachers were providing the equivalent of 180 days of instruction, they had to be paid for 180 days," she said. The proposal, Morgan said, could still save money on utilities, gasoline for buses and pay for support personnel, such as bus drivers and cafeteria workers.
Womack threatened to cut teacher pay if his colleagues don't find some other way to avoid new taxes.
"I'm going to get $30 million somewhere," he said. "I'm not going to vote for a millage increase."
DeKalb has an $85 million deficit and no reserves -- perhaps the worst scenario for a metro Atlanta school system this year.
Board members have discussed about $62 million in cuts. They could close the rest of the gap by raising taxes by 2 mills. Each mill in DeKalb is worth about $15 million. If they did that, though, the district would be at the cap set by voters of 25 mills.
On Wednesday, Atkinson tweaked her previous budget proposal, restoring a busing program for students at magnet schools and other special programs. She also maintained her call to reduce the budget of the Fernbank Science Center by two-thirds, to $1.5 million.
The meeting, which drew a crowd of nearly 350 people, got off to a raucous start. Womack, the chairman of the board's budget committee, announced that he had asked state investigators to probe the system's Finance and personnel departments.He said that in prior years staffers in charge of those departments did not execute cuts approved by the board.
"If that had been done, we would not be in the financial shape we are in today," Womack said, "and that's why I asked the right state agencies to open a criminal investigation."
One board member, pointing out that Womack is up for re-election this year, said the state audits the schools annually and found nothing troubling. After trading further barbs about each other's pay, travel expenses and commitment to children, board members got down to business.
A tentative general fund budget of about $760 million was approved last month, but that was before the board learned that the continued plunge in property values would subtract an additional $12 million in expected proceeds. That necessitated further cuts or tax increases. The tentative budget contains a 1-mill increase in the tax rate that a majority of board members have said they wouldn't approve in a final budget.
That's what prompted Womack to suggest an additional $30 million in cuts.
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