A revised operating budget of $431.2 million for the next school year, that will have 31 fewer teaching positions and 10 fewer custodial positions, while also eliminating for the foreseeable future funding for the popular overnight program at Harford Glen Environmental Center, was approved Monday night by the Harford County Board of Education.
Before approving the final budget, which takes effect July 1, the school board approved amendments to adjust final revenues and expenditures, many of them to set the pay increases negotiated with five unions representing most of the school system's 5,200 employees, including more than 3,000 teachers. About 4,740 positions are covered by the main operating budget, with the remainder being funded by grants or other restricted revenue, such as for food services.
Superintendent Barbara Canavan identified funds to support 1.5 percent cost of living increases, as well as step or longevity raises, to all bargaining units, HCPS Manager of Communications Jillian Lader said, adding: "These increases will vary by employee based on their current salary."
Harford Glen cut
Several advocates for the Harford Glen program, which serves more than 2,500 fifth grade students annually, implored the board to continue the program, but Canavan said there are both financial and practical problems with keeping it going, so she and her staff reluctantly decided to eliminate $270,000 for the program.
"Rather than eliminate, give us the opportunity to restructure and reconfigure," Ruth Eisenhour, the teacher in charge at Harford Glen, asked, noting they had made changes previously when necessary and that canceling the program completely would deprive the students of 15 hours of science study they don't get in their regular school classrooms.
She said the cost amounts to $100 per student, but the program "is priceless."
The overnight program, started 35 years ago, gives the students three days and two overnights at the center, which is off Wheel Road in a wooded and marshy area along Winters Run and Atkisson Reservoir. Students stay in dormitories and engage in a variety of nature and environmental study activities in a camp-like atmosphere, where high school students serve as counselors. The center also has regular day classes that will continue.
Mark Herzog, a former teacher and HCPS science supervisor who was instrumental in starting the Harford Glen overnight program, said it "has been a model program for the rest of the state...because of the residential program; others were mesmerized by it."
"Whatever it costs, the program is worth it," he said.
Ethan Bang, a fifth-grader at Jarrettsville Elementary School, said he had been "dreaming of a trip to Harford Glen to get a break from my two little brothers and parents," only to be disappointed in March when the overnight program was discontinued for the rest of the school year after bedbugs were found in one of the residences.
Even though he was able to take two days of classes at the center, "I still felt I was missing something because I didn't have the chance to stay overnight," Ethan said, expressing the hope his little brothers will get the opportunity he missed.
Hailey Cramer, who just graduated from the University of Delaware and served as a Harford Glen counselor while a student at the Science and Mathematics Academy at Aberdeen High School, said the overnight program builds confidence and teaches students social skills "they don't learn in the classroom."
"It really sets up real world skills early on," she said.
Pressed by board members why she decided to cut the overnight program, Canavan said she and the staff "had some issues and concerns."
In order to provide all fifth-grade students an opportunity to attend, the program operates throughout the school year, and under extreme weather conditions, students have to be taken back to their homes.
The center doesn't have an emergency generator and it needs other upgrades to its facilities, which "are not up to par." While she didn't have a precise estimate, Canavan speculated those costs would run into "millions."
She also said they brought in exterminators to deal with the bedbug program, but it was not resolved.
"There are safety and health issues for a program that is exorbitant for us to run."
Board member Cassandra Beverley, who had two children go through the overnight program, asked Canavan to explore grants and community funding opportunities to fix the facilities and revive the overnight program.
"It's a wonderful program," Beverley said, noting with tongue in check that she was astounded the school system "would take my kids away for free."
Raises, adjustments
According to information supplied the school board Monday, the negotiated salary and wage packages will cost approximately $8.9 million, with about $5.8 million coming from shifts from other areas of the budget and the remaining $3.1 million from the additional funding being received from the county.
Those intrabudgetary moves will cause the net reduction of 31 existing teaching positions, 10 building custodians and 14 inclusion helpers, although some of the latter are being reconfigured into 10 paraprofessional positions needed for the system's expanding program for students with autism.
The amendments also scrapped funding from the original budget for 26 new positions.
Most of the teacher position cuts will come through attrition from retirements or teachers leaving the system. Lader cautioned, however, that "while we anticipate that any positions reduced in order to balance the budget will be through attrition, we cannot confirm that there won't be layoffs."
Ryan Burbey, president of the county teachers union, the Harford County Education Association, said he hasn't had an opportunity to assess the full impact of the position cuts.
He did, however, ask the board to consider eliminating instructional facilitator positions at the elementary school level, which he said "have not been an effective model for professional development," suggesting that the system could save upward of $1 million annually and find more cost effective alternatives for such programs.
About 18 of the teacher position cuts will be spread over the 34 elementary schools, Angela Morton, HCPS executive director of elementary school instruction and performance, said. Canavan noted special education and guidance programs will not be cut.
While the reductions aren't likely to affect class sizes next year, they are having a cumulative effect, according to Canavan, as more than 200 teaching positions were previously cut between the 2010 and 2014 school years.
"They will add up and one day we will wake up to larger class sizes," she said.
Board member Alysson Krchnavy said eliminating 10 custodial positions "is going to put a tremendous strain on our facilities," but HCPS Chief of Administration Joseph Licata assured her the buildings will still be clean and safe for students and staff, because "the folks we have take pride in what they do."
"We're going to do more with fewer people, which is the Harford County way unfortunately the past few years," Licata said.
While the school system is expecting $24.3 million less than it requested from the county, the final budget also was adjusted to reflect almost $2.5 million more in state revenue than originally projected.
Other changes approved Monday show a savings of $3 million from employee turnover and $1.7 million from lowering a projected health insurance increase.
On the revenue side, the planned use of the prior fund balance was increased by $1.75 million to $4.75 million, which raised a red flag for board Vice President Francis "Rick" Grambo.
He cast the only vote against the budget, saying a structural deficit identified in recent audits would continue to get deeper with the continued reliance on reserves to balance the budget, particularly with the system also needing to find ways to pay for $230 million in other post employment benefits, such as health insurance, for retired employees, also known as OPEB.
"It's going to be a problem for years to come," Grambo said.