Garcia excited about proposed budget

By Emily Richmond

Tuesday, April 13, 2004 | 11 a.m.

For the first time in his four-year tenure, Clark County Superintendent Carlos Garcia is proposing an operating budget that is more about growth and new programs than cuts.

"This is probably the best overall budget we've had since I've been here," Garcia said. "We've taken some prudent action over the past few years, and now we're in a position where that's paying off."

The proposed $1.67 billion operating budget for the 2004-05 academic year reflects a spending increase of $152 million, about 10 percent more than the 2003-04 budget of $1.47 billion.

The budget calls for restoring the district's end fund balance to the 2 percent of the operating budget required by state law.

For the past three years, citing budget shortfalls, the district has received a waiver from the state to let the reserves drop to as low as a half-percent -- just enough to keep schools open for three days.

The proposal, which will be reviewed by the Clark County School Board on Wednesday, calls for adding new administrators, expanding the district's energy conservation program and developing a new employee processing center.

It also calls for the district to stockpile bus fuel in anticipation of higher gasoline prices and to provide startup costs for a tuition-based full-day kindergarten program at select schools.

"What the budget doesn't do, unfortunately, is reduce class sizes in the upper grades or implement free, full-day kindergarten for all our students," Garcia said. "It also doesn't bring us any closer to the national average when it comes to per-pupil spending. We're still going to be in the bottom five."

The budget, school administrators say, should help the district keep up with some growth and the enrollment boom.

"The key word here is efficiency, things like saving up for gas, the conservation program, ultimately those things will more than pay for themselves," Walt Rulffes, deputy superintendent of operations, said.

The district expects to keep growing through 2012, when estimates place the district's student population at 400,000. The district now has 268,357 students and expects to top 280,000 next year.

"Our job now is to put as many mechanisms in place to deal with that (the growth)," he said, noting that would include hiring more people, finding facilities and creating ways to help alleviate the issues surrounding growth.

The district plans to add 13 additional elementary computer specialists, who provide technical support to schools, coach teachers and in some cases instruct students.

The budget also calls for giving all employees a negotiated 2 percent pay hike, accounting for $21.5 million, and increasing the district's contributions to employee health insurance funds, for a total of $8.4 million.

Most of the increased expenditures are driven by enrollment growth, according to the summary prepared by the district's business office. The budget includes hiring administrators and teachers for the 13 new schools opening in August.

The budget calls for 897 new employees, including 492 additional teachers and 49 new administrators. New administrators account for about 5 percent of the new employees.

The district could add another 314 people, including nine more administrators and 235 teachers, if the district's growth exceeds estimates, which would bring in more money from the state.

District officials hope to add three assistant regional superintendents, seven assistant principals and a handful of deans and other administrators.

Rulffes said he's working against the perception that the district is top heavy with administrators.

Administrative costs account for just 3.5 percent of the district's total budget, Rulffes said.

"We know this is going to be a tough sell but we're reaching the breaking point," Rulffes said.

He said most of the new administrators would be working directly at school sites, as opposed to at district offices.

John Jasonek, executive director of the Clark County Education Association, said the district's demand for more administrators was "miserable timing."

Jasonek said he knows there are principals and region administrators who are working hard and can use more help, but he said there are are other, more pressing needs that deserve both the district's attention and dollars.

"We have overcrowded classrooms, teachers emptying their own pockets to buy supplies, retiree health insurance issues," Jasonek said. "Where the rubber meets the road isn't in those regional offices, it's in the schools -- and that's where the money should be going."

The assistant regional superintendent salary range is $79,560 to $106,560. The district will spend about $300,000 for the three positions.

But Stephen Augspurger, executive director of the Clark County Association of School Administrators, said the need for more administrators is clear.

"You cannot continue to add thousands of students and dozens of schools without the necessary employees," Augspurger said. "I don't know how people expect the district to continue to function, never mind improve, without adequate, qualified staff to work with, and in, the schools."

Of the 134 elementary school assistant principals at work, 25 percent are responsible for more than one campus, said Agustin Orci, deputy superintendent of instruction for the district.

"Even with seven more (assistant principals) we're still well below where we need to be in terms of staffing," Orci said.

A hiring freeze was placed on administrative posts -- including assistant principals -- last year at the height of the district's budget crisis and the ensuing legislative session.

Each of the district's five regions has a superintendent and two assistant superintendents. Under the current budget plan the northwest, northeast and east regions would each get one additional assistant superintendent.

The northwest region, which includes Summerlin, has seen the most growth since the district was restructured into the five regions more than two years ago, adding 14,000 new students. When the new school year begins in August the northeast region will have opened 13 new campuses while the east region will have opened nine.

All three regions also have at least two dozen schools on the state's "watch list" for failing to show the "adequate yearly progress" on standardized tests as demanded by the federal No Child Left Behind Act.

"The quality of the school depends on the quality of the leadership," Orci said. "The extra assistant superintendents mean there will be more support and guidance coming from the region office for those campuses."