Los Ba&#241;os Unified School District will need to slice nearly $13 million from its budget over the next two years because of a loss of state funding.</p><p>"I've been on the board for 12 years and Los Ba&#241;os has never run into what we've run into now," said board president Dennis Areias at a recent special board meeting.</p><p> District-proposed options to deal with the loss of revenue include layoffs, freezing schools' carry-over account, instituting furlough days, reducing the number of school days, adopting a traditional calendar district-wide, cutting salaries and slashing bus service.</p><p>At the Jan. 28 meeting Dean Bubar, assistant superintendent of administrative services, said the district is looking at a $6 million deficit for 2010-2011 and a $6.8 million shortfall the following year.</p><p>"By the end of 2011-2012, we don't have any more money left," Bubar said.</p><p>Bubar informed board members they'll need to cut close to $7 million in the 2010-2011 fiscal year to balance the budget based on state cuts. Kindergarten through 12th-grade funding is expected to remain low for the next three years.</p><p>One-by-one Superintendent Steve Tietjen addressed the various options trustees have been given.</p><p>* Reducing staffing means eliminating class size reductions, which the state has allocated as an option. Tietjen said laying off 50 teachers would save $3.2 million. Some school sites have made their own adjustments by buying teacher 'prep' periods back rather than adding teachers to the district to avoid a large increase of students per classroom. The high school currently is dealing with a 40-42 to 1 student to teacher ratio in some classes.</p><p>Tietjen said layoffs for teachers would be based on seniority and credentials. The most vulnerable staff members as of now, he said, are multiple subject credential teachers in the kindergarten to third-grade range.</p><p>* Tietjen said freezing the carry-over account, which he believes is about $1.1 million, is an option for the district. The money would not be released to schools until the district can afford it. Carry-over funding from school sites is money saved for educational institutions to use for items such as field trips, projects, etc.</p><p>* Going hand-in-hand with furlough days, the state is recommending reducing instructional days by five, which would amount to about a $1.2 million savings.</p><p>* Adopting a traditional calendar districtwide has a savings of $600,000 to $700,000 Tietjen said, based on reduced transportation, classified, and janitorial costs.</p><p>* Reducing salaries for employees across the board by 1 percent would total $474,000, Tietjen said. A 15 percent salary cut for all employees would need to be enacted to reach the $7 million reduction figure in the next fiscal year .</p><p>* Reducing transportation could mean charging for bus service or eliminating it all together, Bubar added. Los Ba&#241;os' busing program costs $2 million, with the state covering $800,000 of the cost.</p><p>Tietjen said one way to save in transportation costs would be to charge students who use the transportation to attend a school outside of their boundary.</p><p>Trustee Aaron Barcellos said he's not comfortable with the choices put before the board.</p><p>"I'm very uncomfortable with telling 50 people that they're going to take a walk, they don't have jobs anymore, without trying to explore every option that we have. That's a huge blow to our community," Barcellos said. "I'm not going to be comfortable until we have a good understanding when we're making these cuts and how they're effecting these kids and our community, and this district. We're asking people to work harder with less."</p><p>Areias said doing what board members 'have to do' is their only option.</p><p>"It's not going to be good for adults, it's not going to be good for children. The people that make the rules aren't even playing the game with us here. You see what our options are. If there's something else we can do, please give us those ideas. We want to make it hurt as little as possible from 4 year old to 75," Areias said.</p><p>Tietjen informed the board that some decisions need to be made soon, because teachers need to be notified by March 15 if they're going to be laid off. That means an action resolution would be necessary for next Thursday's board meeting.</p><p>Tietjen also shared ideas offered by district staff members. One of them was to close one or two elementary schools. Another was not opening Pacheco High School.</p><p>The elementary schools staff members suggested be closed were Volta and Charleston. Pupils from those schools would be enrolled at the district's other elementary school sites.</p><p>"[Staff is thinking] academically it would raise test scores in other schools but that's not our primary purpose. Our primary purpose is to educate students," Tietjen said. "Closing one of those two schools does not enhance the education of those children or children in other schools. What it does is it closes down opportunities for students and parents to be involved. I don't think our board believes that's a good option."</p><p>Tietjen also rejected the idea of not opening the high school.</p><p>"One thing the board promised the community intially was that we're building this school to offer more opportunities to students. Are we going to keep our word or not?" he said.</p><p>Since there will only be minimal personnel costs to opening Pacheco High, and other staffing and administration needs are coming from within the district, the only major expense is the after-school and sports programs, Tietjen said.