Santa Rosa’s Bellevue Union school board makes final decision on staff cuts, 20 staff to be laid off in June

The financially strapped Bellevue Union School District’s board voted unanimously to terminate 20 staff members, a significant decrease from the district’s first proposal, which would have laid off more than 30 employees at the end of the school year.

The original plan would have terminated the entire district staff of literacy professionals along with a number of teaching assistants.

The first proposal was met with resistance from people who attended the Feb. 20 meeting. Audience members pleaded with trustees to postpone the decision and look into options for recouping the $950,000 revenue shortfall the district faces next year.

“Following the (Feb. 20) board meeting, the board asked for more information with regards to … the financial impact of making any changes, and as well as the educational impact or instructional impact,” Superintendent Michael Kellison said before Wednesday’s meeting.

The new plan saved the jobs of 14 part-time literacy paraprofessionals and four classroom aides.

Kellison said significant cuts were necessary, given the shortfall of state revenues, the expiration of one-time COVID funds and a less than 1% inflation adjustment that will tighten Bellevue’s finances for at least the next two school years.

The district also is on the hook for a legal settlement and has set aside $800,000 over the next two years for the payout. District officials have refused to disclose the nature of the settlement.

The new plan was admittedly better than the previous proposal, but losing any number of staff will negatively affect students, said Carrie Boyce, a 24-year veteran teacher at Bellevue Elementary, who urged the district to look at its administrative costs before going through with the cuts.

“Tonight we're asking you to do what's best for our children,” Boyce said. “Instead of reducing extra support for students, reduce the extra support in your district office … get rid of superintendent support that doesn't directly affect student achievement. This is where the real changes should be made.”

The original plan would have terminated 19 part-time literacy paraprofessionals, who were hired with one-time COVID funds from the state to address learning loss. Instead, nine part-time employees will be laid off at the end of the school year.

The new plan also spares four part-time bilingual literacy paraprofessionals and four classroom aides.

In an ideal world, none of the literacy paraprofessionals would go away because the need is still substantial, said Teresa Gomez, vice president of Bellevue union chapter of the Classified School Employee Association.

“The schools really do need them and it's not fair that these students will continue to not have the support they need,” she said. “We do have a lot of kids being seen by these literacy paraprofessionals and if we continue to eliminate these positions, where do our students stand going into middle school and high school?”

And while Gomez is grateful the board listened to staff pleas, she’s worried they may circle back to eliminating the positions.

“They listened, but these (cuts) potentially can come back next fiscal year,“ Gomez said. ”This is just going to be the first round. And I’m not really sure what’s going to happen in the future. Its disheartening to see.“

Kellison said the district plans to make significant cuts to non-personnel areas such as books and supplies, services and operating expenditures.

The former may mean cuts will affect the district’s special education program, its contract with vendors, the summer school programs, or after school programs, to name a few.

The district will decrease the funds set aside for these categories and monitor the budget as the school year goes on, he added.

“I think it's really worth looking at in order to prioritize personnel decisions, we're really trying to look at it how can we be as diligent as possible and consuming less,” Kellison said.

If the state’s outlook does not improve, the trustees will have to come up with more budget reductions, he said.

“So many of you out there are our friends, our neighbors,” said Board President Lisa Reyes, just before trustees voted on the cuts. “But our hands really are tied.”

Report For America corps member Adriana Gutierrez covers education and child welfare issues for The Press Democrat. Reach her at Adriana.Gutierrez@pressdemocrat.com.