Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD) runs the risk of being taken over by the state. The district had announced that it will run out of funding by November 2019.
According to the District’s official website, unless drastic spending cuts are made before June 2019 in order to balance its budget, there will be no other alternative but for the Sacramento County Office of Education to take over. This would be a quick solution but a slow recovery for the District to become independent once again.
When the state takes over, the local school board will appoint an administrator to overlook the district and make decisions on where funding should be cut and repay the money the state has loaned to the district.
County Superintendent David W. Gordon would be the one appointing the administrator. However, the administrator is not required to work with the school board nor the superintendent. Their main job and focus would be to solely focus on paying off the loan and getting the district back on its feet.
If this occurs, students, parents, and practically everyone else will have no say in what happens during this time within our schools. This recovery process would take up to 10 years or so before members of the community and parents of students would be able to regain a say in the District again.
“It was unfortunate that the District wasn’t able to manage their own funds. If it takes state intervention then let it happen. They shall reap what they sow,” said Julia Cheung (‘20).
SCUSD believes by having the state taking over it would cause a major negative impact on its students due to programs and services being cut in order to repay the debt.
The SCUSD official website stated, “Experts from FCMAT presented to the Sacramento City Unified Board of Education on December 13, 2018 and warned District leaders that a takeover would not be in the best interest of our students. FCMAT has encouraged the District and its labor partners to work together to identify the cost savings necessary to avoid a takeover.”
“A state takeover is not the best thing to happen. But the reality of this district is that it’s something that needs to happen. This district does not know how it got itself to the financial disaster that we have on our hands and I don’t have the confidence that this district will know how to get us out of this disaster. For the past 23 years that I have worked here, this district has always had financial issues and I think it’s just the culture of this district to not pay attention to its budget. So now, I think it’s time for the state to come in and to clean out the Serna Center and create a new culture there that is more responsive to the needs of students and less responsive to the salaries of administrators and others,” stated McClatchy social science teacher Tim Douglas.
McClatchy teachers standing in solidarity with the Oakland teacher strike before school on February 22nd.
Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD) has dolled out over $6 million in vacation time payout to their administrative employees, causing pushback from the Sacramento City Teachers Association (SCTA) as they prepare for a possible strike.
The District has adopted a “use it or lose it” vacation policy in which administrative employees are required to either use accrued vacation time or cash it in for the salary they would have made during this vacation time.
Alex Barrios, a spokesperson for the District said on the implementation of this policy, “The goal [is] to comply with what the law requires us to pay out for unused vacation time, but in the most cost-effective way.”
Such policy has resulted in over $6 million paid out to administrators across the District. McClatchy’s Principal, Peter Lambert, received over $70,000. The largest payout reached over $160,000.
Barrios added, “the District has reduced its financial liability by $4 million and will be saving hundreds of thousands of dollars a year thereafter,” because of the payouts.
According to the District, the accrued vacation time became costly. In a statement released by the District, Superintendent Jorge Aguilar said, “When employees accrue vacation every year and do not use their vacation time for many years, the cost to the District of that accrued and unused vacation time increases every year…This costs the District more money.”
McClatchy teachers and SCTA raised questions surrounding this policy, highlighting the District’s current financial crisis, wherein SCUSD is projected to run out of money by November of this year.
“The District is claiming poverty. It boggles the mind. Every teacher is demoralized by this,” said one of McClatchy’s SCTA representatives, Lori Jablonski. “Unused vacation time can be handled multiple ways. Including, instructing people to take their vacation time. That’s the simplest. There’s structured ways you can do buyouts, from what I understand, to minimize the cost at any particular time.”
Aguilar also stated that administrators are now no longer able to accrue such large amounts of vacation time. “This reduction in vacation days will help the district save money. In addition, non-represented management employees are now required to either use or cash out any vacation carryover above 15 days to further reduce the district’s financial liability and lessen the cost of vacation benefits so more resources are available for our students,” said Barrios.
SCTA has complaints on the method these vacation payouts were distributed. “As with a lot of laws, the district has a lot of leeway as to how they’re going to comply with the law,” said Jablonski. “It’s up to the judgement of the district leadership and the school board to determine what is the proper and most effective way to comply with the law given the financial troubles that they are experiencing.”
“It’s hard to reconcile the District’s budget fiasco with their refusal to address this bureaucratic bloat and scandal,” said SCTA in a statement to teachers across the District.
In response to SCTA’s complaints, Barrios said, “The Sacramento City Teachers Association has been the most vocal critic of the District’s compliance with unused vacation time laws. If the SCTA disagrees with the law, they should advocate at the state level to change it. The District will continue to conduct its business in compliance with the law.”
“This may be legal but I would argue that given the peril that they are claiming that they are in, this is not an ethical, I would not even say it’s a moral decision, that they made. They had a lot of room there for how they wanted to handle this, and this is how they decided to handle it. So they need to accept the criticism of this and they need take responsibility for it,” said Jablonski.
This comes during a tense time between SCTA and the District. After agreeing to and signing an agreement with SCTA to avoid a strike last year, the District has backtracked over a portion of the contract. Disagreement over what was an agreed upon scheduled salary bumps for teachers and guaranteed reduced class sizes have resulted in the District filing suit against SCTA.
“If you have a disagreement over the language of a contract you go to arbitration, which is well established in labor law. So what the district did in trying to sue us was virtually unprecedented,” said Jablonski.
Elected SCTA representatives unanimously chose to vote on a possible strike because of the issue. McClatchy teachers will be voting on a strike at the upcoming staff meeting in early March.
McClatchy’s Legion at the February 19th game against private school St. Mary’s.
The gym is filled with sound. Screams of celebration and loss emanate from a student section with a 10 year history and a bit of a rocky past. McClatchy’s Legion comes together for what feels like the first time in a long time at February 19th’s playoff game against St. Mary’s of Stockton that ultimately knocked McClatchy’s women’s basketball out of the sections tournament.
McClatchy students packed over half of the bleachers section.
Less than a week earlier, in one of the first playoff games of the season for the Lady Lions, this same student section took up one portion of one section.
“Back in the ‘90s it was a packed house. I want to say the drop off was only in the last couple of years. But all the same, in the last couple years, whenever we got to the playoffs, things changed.” said McClatchy’s Athletic Director Robert Feickert in the hours before the game. Feickert is referring to the student turn out spike that occurs when a team makes it to the playoffs.
These heavily attended playoff games usually see an increase in ticket sales over regular season games.
Feickert explains that most teams do get a spike in student turn out when the playoffs begin, but in recent years, turn out at both regular and playoff games have shrunk. “This year the only games that we had an organized student section was the Kennedy home game on January the 25th for basketball. For football, we only had 5 home games, and I think two of them were an organized event to where the student section was there.”
During regular season games, ticket sales go directly to the athletic department to cover equipment, officials, and athletic training supplies. Though, during playoff games all revenue goes directly to CIF Sac Joaquin Sections, with no cash flow going to McClatchy. Meaning the spike in revenue experienced during playoff season cannot be used by the athletic department.
“The playoff games make a little more money just because it’s a bigger game when we get to the playoffs, we’re playing an opponent that also qualified for the playoffs, as compared to a regular season game. But in my thinking, there shouldn’t be that much of a difference because all our games should be supported by our students,” said Feickert.
Feickert suggests that something at McClatchy’s core has temporarily been lost, causing the lack of turn out to regular season and even playoff games, “I think it’s part of the culture of the school that needs to be addressed.”
In recent years, McClatchy has experienced its fair share of culture-shifting events. Two walkouts, racially charged controversies, bomb threats, and a lawsuit or two, namely. In recent months alone the school has experienced two shooting threats and a deep involvement in the mounting tension between the District and the Sacramento City Teachers Association.
Walk down the halls and hear snippets of conversation: “McClatchy is trash” or “I hate this school” are not uncommon phrases tossed around on campus.
One October morning, Theo Dopkins (‘19) discussed with The Prospector the past controversies McClatchy has experienced. “Even though I love this school and I love most of the people that go here, it reminds me that we’re still all normal people. There’s still people that make stupid mistakes, and they don’t think when they do things, and they’re still kids. Those things aren’t okay and they shouldn’t be accepted, but I don’t think it represents us as as a school.”
Dopkins, along with Madeline Feickert (‘19), is a Legion leader that holds out hope for the over 10 year old student section and the culture of McClatchy.
“I think there’s a lot of people who probably feel guilty…they see the stuff online they see the stuff in the papers, they see the way they’re talked about and then they probably feel bad about it, but I think what people are forgetting is that they’re still individuals, they still can make a change by being themselves and doing the right thing and also still going to school here,” said Dopkins.
McClatchy has not always been this way. For years, the student section was packed. “When you walked into the gym, the [players] were completely astonished by how many people were there,” said Feickert. “Parents came over afterwards and told me that it was the best experience they have ever had because of how packed it was, how loud it was.’”
This Legion of old was not built from an eager and raucous student body, but from a year that began in tragedy. At the beginning of the 2007 school year, five McClatchy students passed away. This same year, girl’s volleyball, boy’s soccer, and girl’s basketball all made it to the playoffs. For some of these teams, it was the first time in a long time. Legion was founded in the midst of this year, one where students clung to the catharsis of a winning team to boost the spirit and the culture of the school. “Each game just grew and grew, the whole section was full,” reminisced Feickert.
Tragedy built Legion. Now Legion looks to put McClatchy’s more recent tragedies in the past, “People are still excited to go to this school, and I’m still trying to do my part to get people excited about doing the right thing and going to this school and just being good people and good students,” said Dopkins.
Though culture may not be the only thing deterring students from coming out to games. The question of outreach was brought up by students and staff alike. “I feel like more efforts could be made to expand the audience we reach. The majority of the time it’s the people who signed up in ASB and although it’s expected for ASB to come out we should have more people from the general public come,” said Madeline Feickert.
“I know there’s roughly 100 students in ASB and I think that it’s there job as a class to create the culture here at McClatchy,” said Robert Feickert.
As the Lady Lions continue into the playoffs, now looking towards a possible state championship game, turn out continues to grow.
“I haven’t been to the games all season, mainly because I have other sports but we have to support our teams to make them feel more motivated and encourage them to play better during the games,” said Reagan Marr (‘22) at a recent playoff game.
“What are you gonna do cheer for another school? Like no. And like you go to this school so just have a good time and cheer it on. Why not?” Dopkins said at a playoff game in early February.
“I don’t even like this school. I’m just having fun and making a fool of myself,” added Maya Steinhart (‘19).
For now, Legion sets its sights on expansion. “Until we have every single student, and every single teacher coming to the game there’s never gonna be a full Legion. It’s always gonna be, ‘we could be bigger,’” said Dopkins.
The question of ‘how’ seems far from the minds of those that keep hope for McClatchy. The question for the awakening lion only comes down to when: “It doesn’t matter if it’s not possible because we’re still going to try. It’s something we should strive for,” finished Dopkins.
Regardless of school politics and culture, it seems we have basketball games to win, and seeds of hope to be planted. The Lion can only roar louder.
The junior ASB class. Photo credit: Chris Rinetti.
The junior ASB class is currently $1300 in debt. This fund deficit has caused concern among many students that ASB may not be able to afford Junior Prom. The Prom is happening, but the class of 2020 went into debt to pay for it, leaving ASB leaders scrambling to come up with funds for next year’s activities.
ASB Treasurer Nicole Fong, Secretary Mackenzie Crall, and President Adelina Hernandez all pointed out that the lack of funding stems from a deeper problem in the ASB and HISP class schedules, which result in a lack of sophomore representation.
“Because all HISP sophomores have a mandatory zero period, we have a very small number of sophomores in ASB every year—this year we have about six to eight sophomores,” said Fong. “This is really bad for all classes, but especially sophomores, because that is when fundraising for Junior Prom needs to happen.”
This dilemma has caused significant debt for the class of 2020. “Freshmen year, there were a good amount of people in the 2020 [ASB] class, but sophomore year—when the HISP students have a zero period—there was a total of three sophomores in the class, and to ask three people to fundraise for the entire class is ridiculous,” said Crall.
In order to fill this funding void, ASB has begun to scramble to raise money.
“The junior class has had a lot fundraising ideas and plans. The flower grams were a huge success, Lisi Long is currently heading the planning of a bake sale, we had our yard sale and bake sale in December, and we are planning Cycle Life and Quickly fundraisers,” said Fong. “At the rate we are going right now, I have high hopes that we will be able to repay our debt.”
President Hernandez provided an update for the status of the ASB treasury. “We recently did the Valentine’s Day flower delivery, which brought in around $300. However, we are still in debt by $1300.”
The ASB class of 2020 is not only concerned about paying off debt and successfully throwing a Junior Prom. “Here’s the thing, we are having a Junior Prom. But it is going to be hard to pull of all of the events that will be happening in our senior year such as our senior gift and our ball,” said Secretary Crall.
“In order to pay off our debt and have money for all of our senior activities, we need a lot of people to go to this prom! High attendance means high ticket sales, which gives us more money to spend on our senior activities!” said Treasurer Fong.
A car parked outside of a spot in the student parking lot, due to the lack of student parking available. Photo credit: Adriana Barrios.
A car parked outside of a spot in the student parking lot, due to the lack of student parking available. Photo credit: Adriana Barrios.
In recent weeks, parking problems have plagued the mornings of hundreds of C.K.M. students. Students with and without parking passes have been forced to park on surrounding neighborhood streets, often earning them parking tickets and long walks to class.
The closest street on which students can legally park is Third Avenue, a ten minute walk from the school.
“I think it’s illogical, unfair, and irresponsible to expect students to walk such long distances and risk parking violations when there are so many unused spots in the staff lot,” said RJ Czajkowski (‘20).
However, even students with C.K.M. parking passes have had difficulties recently.
“Parking spots aren’t designated, so you are never assured a spot,” said Ysa Farland (‘19). “Luckily for me, I get there for zero period so the lot is empty.” Other students have not had such luck.
As April Alford (‘20) stated, “A good amount of students, who would be late if they parked on Third Avenue, park in the front of the school.”
One such student, Maddie Elkins (‘20), was called out of class to move her vehicle last week.
“I got my license and car after the school year had started, so there wasn’t an option for me to attain a parking pass,” said Elkins. “For the first few weeks, I would park on Third.”
However, walking back to her car after she finished soccer practice became unsafe in the dark, she went on to say. “That’s why I started to park at the front. When I was called out of class because I needed to move my car, I was incredibly angry because the school offered no safe, constant option for new drivers and pulled me out of class to move my car.”
Daisy Lewis (‘19) also had significant difficulty obtaining a parking pass. “Since I wasn’t there on orientation day, I wasn’t there to get a pass in person. I sent emails to admin and Hubbard, but no one responded or helped. So, I talked to Officer Graham around the first two weeks of school, and he put me on a waiting list, which had two other students on it. I was never contacted,” said Lewis. “In the beginning of the year I would drive for ten minutes to school, park on 17th, then spend fifteen minutes walking to class!”
Campus security has recently cracked down on students, only allowing those with passes to enter the lot. However, many students with parking passes do not regularly use them. “There’s no way to find out who isn’t using [their pass] because parking is unassigned,” said Alford.
This is no new issue at C.K.M., and many students have ideas of reforms that would provide better student parking situations. Czajkowski added that “After talking with Officer Graham, it’s clear that no solution will change the fact that our campus simply isn’t built to accommodate the amount of parking needed for students, staff, and visitors.”
Alford and Elkins also proposed a switch of the student and teacher parking lots. They believe this change would allow more students a safe and close place to park.
It’s hard to miss. In an attempt to clean up McClatchy’s campus, the “Clean Up Song” played over the school intercom to mark the end of every lunch period and remind students to clean up. After about a week of playing every day at lunch, the Clean Up song was replaced by an announcement over the intercom five minutes before the end of lunch reminding students to pick up after themselves.
The initial decision to introduce the Clean Up song was made in response to the widespread trash littering McClatchy’s hallways and quads. Growing tired of seeing the an increase in the amount of trash across campus, the members of C.K.M.’s Shared Decisions meeting, a committee of parents, teachers, students, faculty, and administrators, decided it was finally time to do something about it.
There were several suggestions lined up to take on the trash epidemic, one of which included closing the science quad during lunch, which is noticeably one of the most populated and trash-filled lunch spots on campus. The members of the meeting settled instead for the Clean Up song to run for a couple minutes, as it was less intrusive on the students.
The song played for five minutes when it was first introduced, but after a few days there was a collective acknowledgement in ASB that five minutes was too long and 30 seconds would suffice.
After that, numerous old and new variations of the song were played at the end of lunch period, a seemingly different version of the song each day.
Donovan Wakeman (‘20) said about the song: “It’s too annoying and blaring; it hurts my ears.” He said it throws him off because it makes him prepare for fifth period sooner than he needs to.
Another student, who wishes to remain anonymous, said, “It’s terrible and makes me want to penguin dive on my head.”
Another anonymous student added, “It was an assault on my delicate eardrums.”
ASB president Daisy Lewis offered her opinion on the decision to add the clean up song to the passing period music. Well aware of the backlash the song has been receiving, she expressed that if students are opposed to it or any decisions made affecting the students at C.K.M., the meetings are open. While there are designated student representatives who are allowed to vote, students can still attend and add their input.
Only progress towards a cleaner campus can show for the song’s effectiveness. The clean up song and its backlash indicate that if kids at C.K.M. wish to have their voices heard in the decision making process, the Shared Decisions meetings are open to any and all students.
Bacerra helping a student fill out their voter registration form in McClatchy’s library.
Credit: Rich Pedroncelli, Associated Press
Bacerra helping a student fill out their voter registration form in McClatchy’s library. Credit: Rich Pedroncelli, Associated Press
Attorney General Xavier Becerra, class of ‘76, gave the Spanish-language response to the State of the Union on Tuesday in McClatchy’s own library. It was the first time the Spanish-language Democratic response has been delivered live.
Becerra, who was appointed by former Governor Jerry Brown to replace Kamala Harris, is California’s first attorney general. He has gained notoriety as one of the chief adversaries against the Trump administration. During his time as attorney general, he has filed over 100 legal actions against the Trump administration, including defending the Affordable Care Act and the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA).
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement that they had chosen Becerra because of his record fighting against “the Trump administration’s harmful and divisive attacks.”
Throughout his address that was delivered live on Telemundo, he slammed Trump’s policies and threatened legal action against Trump’s proposal to divert money from Puerto Rico and other disaster aid to fund the border wall. “We will reject this foolish proposal in court the moment it hits the ground,” he said.
“How can it be that the state of our young, rich, and strong nation is now disorder, tension, and hostility?” he added in response to Trump’s “obsession” with building a border wall.
The address was given in McClatchy’s library to an audience of around 50 McClatchy students, who served as “political observers and critical analysts for their peers,” according to Lori Jablonski, a social science teacher. Those present were able to ask questions of Becerra after the address.
“I’m a Lion through and through…it’s nice to come back…you know it makes you feel like you’re at home,” he told the press on why he chose McClatchy to give the address.
McClatchy senior and Brown Issues member, Ariadne Castaneda, sited McClatchy’s diversity as reason enough to be chosen. “Walking the hallways I always hear at least three different languages being spoken, we’re just incredibly diverse and especially right now that our country is so divided, I feel like at this school we can really unite and just be a school, become educated, become a community of young people that are just trying to make it through this.”
Castaneda added, “It was inspiring to see Xavier Becerra speak at C.K.M., to know that someone so important and which such power to make positive change was walking the same hallways and going through the same life as my peers and I.”
Becerra told the press that he hoped McClatchy students walked away understanding that “they can participate, they can be part of the State of the Union, they can see what it’s like, that it’s not that difficult, and that at the end of the day, they better get ready because they’re going to be the future leaders.”
Graffiti was found in a student bathroom on Thursday reading, “Don’t come to school Friday.” In an automated school wide phone call and email, Principal Peter Lambert stated that law enforcement was contacted to investigate the apparent threat.
“Please rest assured that at this time students at McClatchy are safe and we do not anticipate any disruptions to our regularly planned school day,” said Lambert.
McClatchy is not new to threats of this nature. Last year in the aftermath of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School shootings, McClatchy was subject to a shooting threat that kept many students home.
McClatchy has also experienced two separate bomb threats. One, an empty guitar case left outside the school in 2016, and the other a cell-phone left in the D-Wing bathroom that was modeled to appear as though it was an explosive device in 2017.
Some students expressed worry at this recent incident. “I don’t really trust the staff to keep us safe, but also things like this aren’t unusual,” said Blake Aboueljoud (‘21).
From left to right: Secretary Mackenzie Crall, Vice President Izzy Veran, President Adelina Hernandez, and Treasurer Nicole Fong. Photo Credit: Rose Clara.
From left to right: Secretary Mackenzie Crall, Vice President Izzy Veran, President Adelina Hernandez, and Treasurer Nicole Fong. Photo Credit: Rose Clara.
On January 18th, the winners of McClatchy’s ASB election were announced. After weeks of campaigning and anticipation, President Adelina Hernandez, Vice President Izzy Veran, Secretary Mackenzie Crall, and Treasurer Nicole Fong, all juniors, began to plan their upcoming year of leadership on campus.
Although each new board member will bring a unique perspective to ASB, their statements reveal a common vision for our school’s student leadership: to expand representation and create schoolwide confidence.
In the wake of recent unrest in the ASB class, Nicole Fong wishes to “settle the dust caused by all the chaos that happened in our first quarter.” She explains that the root of this chaos is the lack of guidance ASB students have had this year.
“It’s important that the students in ASB not only feel supported by other students but by the teachers as well,” said Fong. As a third generation McClatchy student, Nicole wants to share her school pride with all students and believes that this process should begin with confidence within the group of students leading ASB.
Secretary Mackenzie Crall hopes that school unity can be found through “representation of the whole school within the student government.” She believes that her victory of the race for secretary was the first step in this process.
“I felt like I could do a good job as secretary and thought that I would bring a good perspective to the board seeing that I am in VAPA and general education, and our previous board was only HISP,” said Crall. She hopes to breach the divide between HISP students and the rest of McClatchy, pulling together the campus as a whole.
Vice President Izzy Veran elaborated on this idea. She said that if ASB could persuade more schoolwide involvement, the atmosphere of the school may shift.
“I’ve seen since my freshman year that there has been less and less spirit and involvement and I’d like to bring back some of that pride in our school,” said Veran. This process will require increased communication between the representatives of ASB and the entire student body. As Izzy explained, ASB “struggles to get information out to the population.” More publicization of events as well as better awareness of ASB’s role at McClatchy will foster confidence in student leaders, hopefully paving the way for a more harmonious community.
President Adelina Hernandez believes that currently “if you’re not in HISP, it basically seems like ASB isn’t there.” Her goal is to make the face of ASB more prominent and available to all students, stripping away the “negative connotations” that are currently associated with it. This apparent exclusivity is detrimental to the program’s success, and has contributed to recent reductions in funding. “Right now we’re struggling to catch up with funds for junior prom,” said Hernandez. She believes that “once we get [it] out there that ASB is meant for everyone and affects everyone, I think that will help us solve a lot more problems.”
Adelina, Izzy, Mackenzie, and Nicole hope to build school unity by involving the entire school community. They hope that their leadership will provide the wider representation McClatchy needs in order facilitate confidence and pride among students.
For the first time, the Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD) adopted budget for the 2018-2019 fiscal year has been disapproved by the county Office of Education, and the district is expected to go broke by November of 2019.
SCUSD’s deteriorating financial condition met its final decline in August when the district’s budget proposal was rejected by the county Office of Education. This development in the state of the district’s budget was announced by Superintendent Jorge Aguilar and School Board President Jessie Ryan on September 6, through a video posted on the district’s YouTube account.
County Superintendent David W. Gordon disapproved the $555 million budget on grounds that while the district would make its minimum reserve requirement for the 2018-2019 fiscal year, it would reach a “negative fund balance” by the 2019-2020 school year, falling $21 million short, and subsequently another $40 million for the following 2020-2021 school year.
Gordon’s letter of disapproval designated “unrestricted expenditures” as the main cause of the worsening financial situation, “even though the district has been asked to solve its structural deficit problem.”
Following the letter’s conclusion that “the district begin making cuts immediately,” the district was assigned until October 8 to file a revised budget that would serve as a sufficient replacement to the budget that was previously submitted. On December 5, the SCUSD announced in their video statement their final preparations to address their financial crisis, which would majorly involve cuts to employee healthcare.
In the video, Aguilar addressed his current position in the financial crisis, stating, “I’ve done everything in my power to keep cuts away from the classroom, and while I’ve made millions of ongoing cuts in expenditures, primarily in central office administration that is already one of the leanest in the region, unfortunately these cuts are not enough to eliminate our structural budget deficit.”
School Board President Jessie Ryan reiterated his point in her statement, “While the Superintendent has gone as far as he can in reducing costs we are now forced to look to identifying other areas to save money.” Both Ryan and Aguilar tirelessly restated throughout the video that “[their] continued goal was to ensure that students and their families aren’t impacted.”
Superintendent Jorge Aguilar and Board President Jessie Ryan suggested this was the only suitable path towards a solution, considering that SCUSD “pays far more for employee health insurance than any other school district in the region for similar benefits.” The statement mentioned that the proposed healthcare cuts would save the district between 11 and 16 million dollars a year.
As was formally announced at the Board of Education meeting on December 6, the district has received approval from four of five of its labor unions to begin healthcare cuts.
To do so, however, would require adequate cooperation from the Sacramento City Teachers Association (SCTA). On December 7, the SCTA released an article addressing the district’s announcement to hold a press conference that would discuss the budget and healthcare management. The SCTA has since withheld their decision to participate in the conference.
In 2017, the SCTA agreed to partner with the California Education Coalition for Health Care Reform (CECHR) to work towards reducing health care costs without significantly reducing benefits or increasing employee costs. This partnership was most important to the SCTA because it promised that no changes would be made to employee healthcare plans without written, explicit agreement from the SCTA. The potential savings from working with CECHR could be up to $16 million.
According to the members of the SCTA, instead of picking itself up and starting the work with the CECHR in January 2018 as was agreed upon, the district “dragged its feet, to the point that in August and September it refused to pay CECHR for its work, despite the signed agreement.” In the same report, the SCTA stated that “despite the district’s delays, [their] work with the CECHR has already resulted in $5 million in health plan savings to the district.”
The district’s refusal to abide by the agreement has diminished the SCTA’s support, and their failure to follow through with the CECHR agreement has only emphasized the district’s inadequacies, even more than the seemingly unending financial crisis has done so far.
