GILROY
– Despite nearly an hour’s worth of protests from district
employees whose jobs are on the line, school board trustees
authorized district staff to hand out layoff notices this
month.
The board approved layoffs, as well a reduction in hours worked,
that will affect more than 20 district employees.
GILROY – Despite nearly an hour’s worth of protests from district employees whose jobs are on the line, school board trustees authorized district staff to hand out layoff notices this month.
The board approved layoffs, as well a reduction in hours worked, that will affect more than 20 district employees.
Five certificated employees – two nurses, a counselor, psychologist and After-School Program facilitator – that equal 4.4 full-time workers will be cut. So will the equivalent of nearly nine classified employees: A bus mechanic, bus service person, staff secretary and program manager. Some classified employees will have their hours cut, including bus drivers, a warehouse worker, secretaries and dispatchers. Five vacant positions currently filled by substitutes also will be eliminated, including three bus drivers, a campus supervisor and an enrollment secretary.
The cuts are part of a $2.5 million reduction from the Gilroy Unified School District budget from 2004-06.
The May 13 vote was met with resistance from dozens of district employees who attended the meeting.
Several nurses told the board that if the district lays off one full-time and one part-time nurse, the two full-time and one part-time nurse left will not be able to keep up with students’ needs.
A judge determined that the nurses would be able to provide “bare bones” mandatory services.
The nurses told trustees that the number of diabetic students, who require blood glucose testing and diet review, has increased from three in 2001-02 to 16 this year. Also, while enrollment for the last three years was near 9,400 students, visits to school health offices averaged 29,511 each year.
The decision to reduce services weighed on trustees, who repeatedly noted that layoffs may not happen if alternatives are found by the final budget approval in June.
“Unfortunately, we don’t have control over the money that comes into the district,” Board President Jaime Rosso said. “We have to make some hard choices: These are not choices we look forward to.”
Trustee Jim Rogers said he is bothered by the impact to nursing services, but said it is difficult to choose to save nursing over another service that is being reduced, like counseling.
“I can support, legally, the statement that we followed the law, but ethically and morally it’s very difficult for me to say (nursing is) where we should save $190,000,” he said.
Employees from the classified group said students will also be directly hurt by fewer bus routes, bus service people and yard supervisors.
“Usually, the first person a student sees in the morning is a classified employee: a bus driver, custodian, yard duty supervisor, secretary …,” said Rita Delgado, the classified employees union president.
Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Linda Piceno, in introducing the board resolution to reduce the classified employees – mostly by cutting one bus mechanic and bus drivers’ hours – called them the “backbone” of the district.
“They drive our kids to school, they feed them … they are very, very valued in this district,” she said.
The district is continuing to study the impact of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s budget revision, released last week, and trustees vowed to keep looking for ways to save jobs.
“I can tell you it’s going to be very difficult, unless we get some more, unanticipated revenue,” Diaz said.
