Manatee County Schools Budget Cuts

By Aaron Deslatte and Josh Hafenbrack
Tallahassee Bureau
January 7, 2009
TALLAHASSEE

The Florida Legislature´s budget-cutting special session will hit hardest in the classroom, as school districts learned Tuesday how deep a cash crunch they faced under plans legislators plan to formalize today.

Lawmakers are in the first week of a 12-day session to pare about $2.3 billion from the state´s battered spending plan for the year.

Included in $490 million in public education cuts, Broward County must shave $35.6 million and Palm Beach County must erase $24.3 million - the third round of cuts in public education since 2007, a trend that will “deprive our schoolchildren of a quality education,” said Rep. Martin Kiar, D-Davie.

Gov. Charlie Crist has asked lawmakers to eliminate much less than $900 million in total government spending - mainly for health care and education - by using more than $1 billion in budget reserves, a call he repeated Tuesday after meeting with economic development officials.

“What are we supposed to do, sit around and admire that money?” Crist said. “It´s there for a reason, and the reason is to utilize it when we´re in tough times. Here we are.”

House and Senate lawmakers do plan to tap budget reserves, a separate fund supported by tobacco suit settlement proceeds, and other dedicated pools of cash.

“Everything´s on the table, including trust funds,” said House education and general government budget chief Rep. David Rivera, R-Miami.

But lawmakers are also facing the likelihood of much deeper cuts of $4 billion or more in the regular session this spring, as Florida´s economy continues sliding deeper into red ink.

Given that, lawmakers said it was unlikely they would go as far as Crist wants in emptying those reserves now.

“We´re looking down the barrels of a deepening recession,” said state Sen. Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, a former school district superintendent.

“You can only sweep those trust funds one time. You can only spend your savings account once.”

Education - the largest general revenue expense for the state - is taking the biggest hit. But the blow is somewhat cushioned because Crist already had ordered schools to withhold 4 percent of their budgets because of the declining economy. For that reason, Broward County schools had already cut their budget by $34 million - meaning the special session will force administrators to dig only about $1.5 million deeper.

Still, the new cuts don´t sit well with local education officials.

“What really disturbed me was they didn´t entertain anything but cuts,” Broward School Board Chairwoman Maureen Dinnen said of legislators. “It was only how much and what.”

Broward schools cut $128 million in the past two years. Previous cuts forced the district to scrap construction projects, freeze hiring and keep hundreds of jobs open.

Cutting school funding is “terrible policy,” Kiar said. “I think it is disgraceful that the majority party has taken all of the options off the table. What they´re doing, once again, is cutting the budget on the backs of our children.”

In Palm Beach County, Tuesday´s $24.3 million figure was only about $1 million higher than what the district had been bracing for since August, said the district´s lobbyist, Vern Crawford.

“Frankly, it could´ve been a hell of a lot worse,” Crawford said. He added that school district officials are far more worried about the cuts to schools that could take place in the regular session that begins in March.

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