1-27-04 Even though the community has grown by 30% in the last 10 years, according to the census, enrollment has shrunk by nearly 15%. The parents have spoken by pulling their kids out of the school district.
The superintendent and some of the board members claim that all the community needs is massive growth to solve the problem, and apparently intend to fully support high-density growth in the community.
At the same time, for the third time, the superintendent and the school board are trying to pass a bond issue to build a school that they don’t need because they have no students to fill the classrooms. They claim magically passing the bond issue will solve all of their problems and that the only reason the parents are taking their children out of the school is the fact that the students are housed in modular buildings.
Simultaneously, they are promoting a consolidation to save $400,000.00 a year which included some draconian ideas such as shutting down the district and giving our schools to the Antelope Valley or closing the Acton and Agua Dulce schools, all as threats if we don’t pass the bond issue.
They want to eliminate class size reduction for 27 classes now operating with only 20- students, to save a paltry $60,000.00 a year. Just imagine the damage to these kids in small classes which would occur by forcing them into much larger classes to same what amounts to chicken feed out of a $12,000,000.00 annual budget.
They filed a first interim report with the County for next year, which was tentatively accepted with only two questionable areas. The first was the continually declining enrollment and the second, the fact that they have not settled the contract with the teachers union for 2001-2002, 2002-2003, 2003-2004, or 2004-2005.
It is assumed that the $400,000.00 reduction which they are trying to achieve through consolidation is what they intend to give the teachers as a raise. The average teacher’s salary for the district, including benefits and pension, exceeds $80,000.00 for working just 180 days a year. They get a 2% annual raise called "step and column", which they claim is not a raise and they are demanding an additional 5% per year retroactively.
Most other districts have settled these years with no additional raises except for the 2% "step and column".
Bandaras, at the last board meeting, stated, "This district has always been generous in granting raises to the union".
As to consolidation, the "Bird Plan" of relocating Vasquez High to the old High Desert campus, relocating High Desert to the old Meadowlark site, and moving the primary kids from Meadowlark to the Acton School, is the best plan to deal with the shrinking enrollment. According to the school, the teachers and the students, the Red Rover site is unusable after wasting nearly $5,000,000.00 on it. The kids got it right. Its trailer trash high. The $400,000.00 savings per year can go into more books and supplies and better quality education to draw the students back to the district. It will also pay for the 2% "step and column" raises the teachers get.
Bandaras’ claim that the $400,000.00 reduction is to meet the shortfall which would occur if the state refinance bonds are not passed is just smoke and mirrors, hiding the use of this money for another massive salary increase for the union.
You will note that $320,000.00 savings on an annual basis comes from eliminating administrative and overhead costs for the Red Rover site. Even if the bond was passed, and the buildings were built without any cost overruns, that $320,000.00 saved is committed to cover existing expenses and the school where we would waste $12,000,000.00 of taxpayers’ money would sit empty.
Bandaras has refused to follow the Brown Act in making documents available to the public at school board meetings and has refused to provide data requested under the Public Records Act. Now that we have gotten rid of Dusick, we now need to get rid of Bandaras and take our schools back.
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