The USC School District is researching what—if any—classrooms it can increase in size to save money on staffing.In addition, the USC superintendent and finance director were receptive to pay freezes. I didn't hear what number Steinhauer's and Klein's pay freeze was on "the list." Maybe they were number 39 and 40. It is a shame that the rest of the list is confidential.
Administrators presented information to the school board Monday night.
"We're not talking about increasing class size because we want to, but because we might need to," said Rebecca Stern, school board president.
Another hot topic in USC was athletics. Superintendent O'Toole said there has been no decrease in athletic participation since the pay-to-play fees were introduced at the beginning of the school year. The district received $60,000 in fees.
Don't miss this in the USC Patch:
New Baker Elementary Principal
Patrick McClintock-Comeaux will become the new Baker Elementary principal on April 9...
McClintock-Comeaux is currently the principal of Stephen C. Foster Elementary School in the Mt. Lebanon School District.
He is an Upper St. Clair High School graduate and was a teacher and curriculum leader in the Upper St. Clair School District from 1995 to 2001
Read more: USC school board explores increasing class sizes
16 comments:
Interesting we still haven't heard a peep from the union. Or the media. So the reporters are looking at a potential massive corruption/cover-up story in suburbia yet ignore it. And that very crooked entity is now keeping secret how many teaching jobs will be eliminated (sold down the river) yet the teachers' union, the same body that helped make this community almost unaffordable has nothing to say?? We truly live in an alternate universe.
The reporters had a bigger story, Samuel. We hired a new football coach. Who wants to talk about a $900,000 grievance now? They can report about it next year, or the year after, or the year after that...
Elaine
Mr. Adams,
We haven't heard from Solicitor Matthew Hoffman either. He negotiated the 2001 Teachers' Contract that was extended in 2004 and extended again in 2010.
The 2001 Contract had a very unusual EDR Pool that required we pay out the entire Pool to the remaining EDR folks if some were eliminated. EDR was supposed to increase 3.5% per year but the increase in one year's budget was so large they had to take some back in future years to average out to 3.5%.
Mr Hoffman has a history of labor law and also chaired the Act 34 hearing while the Board sat in the audience and testified instead of listening to the community. Mr. Hoffman has filled in for the Solicitor at some meetings when the architect presented if memory serves me correctly. I wonder if Mr. Hoffman is involved in construction issues as well as personnel issues?
Another attorney came in to negotiate the 2010 Contract Extension and now we have heard from the union with a $900,000 claim.
It would be interesting to hear the Solicitor's side of the story but we won't because he is the Board's Solicitor, not ours.
Funny how grievances should all be settled before a Contract is finalized but it looks to me like someone didn't do his homework. The Solicitor and the Superintendent usually finalize all the Contracts.
Hey Matt, Hey Tom, Hey Tim, what happened in the last negotiations that allowed the grievance to appear?
If not the Solicitor, then who looked? There is no Finance Committee or Personnel committee because JoPo is TOO SMART to appoint those committees.
Now we are hearing 100 teachers may be involved for up to 14-15 years. You can bet Dr. Sable would have rolled heads by now.
John
Until we get some straight shooters in the administration and on the board, taxpayers will never know the real story behind the school district budget.
Dr. Steinhauer whines about how Gov. Corbett/PDE cut funding, how its not his fault for our deficits. Sounds like my kids, "its not my fault, they did it."
Unfortunately we get this opposing story from PA Sunshine Review.
"Fiscal Year 2013 State Budget
Budget Secretary Charles Zogby predicted in Dec. 2011 that the state would face a revenue shortfall of at least $500 million and that the commonwealth will be searching for at least $750 million in cuts to balance the FY2013 state budget that includes mandated increases in debt payments, pension costs and welfare spending.[5]
Governor's Proposed Budget
Gov. Tom Corbett released his proposed $27.13 billion FY2013 state budget, which can be found here, on Feb. 7, 2012. It lowers spending less than a tenth of a percentage point from FY2012, when the state budget was $27.16 billion. The governor proposed steep cuts to higher education, but did not raise taxes.[6] The higher education cuts include 30 percent cuts in state aid to state-related universities like Penn State, Temple and Pitt, and 20 percent cuts for the state-owned universities, but largely level funds community colleges and public schools.[7]
Basic education funding for K-12 will increase from $5.3 billion this fiscal year to $5.4 billion, although pre-K and Head Start funding will be cut as would $100 million in accountability block grants to schools.[6]"
Seems to be a conflict here according to the review. Dr. S says they cut his funding, but according to the Sunshine Review funding for K-12 jumped from $5.3 billion to $5.4 billion. So, who's right?
Furthermore, even if the state did cut funding, Dr. S for example demanded, I'm told a generous raise, even though he knew well budget problems were escalating. There was also no concern for budgets, when the district ignored zoning regs. and then when they didn't get their way, costs taxpayers over $24,000 in litigation.
On top of that, where does he think Harrisburg will come up with the money to plug their huge deficit let alone his?
Of course no problem. Like the absurd discussion on student parking fees, athletic fees, facilities fees etc. etc. and so forth and so on... the bottom line is it ALL comes out of our pockets. The administration gets their money and proclaims we held the line on taxes. Hey Dr. S. - a fee IS A TAX - in sheep's clothing.
There is no real fiscal restraint being discussed. They just hired a new football coach for over $110,000. They just authorized a $41,000 fund raising feasibility study. Not a real fund raiser, just a study on one. But rest assured, they are looking to cut consultant fees, yeah right.
Hey folks, I've got this bridge in Brooklyn, I want to sell you. It is time for Dr. Steinhauer to put down his crying towel, and get to work living with his, no scratch that, "our" means. USC seems to be getting the message.
Andy Bachman
Andy, to your point and as posted before on the blog from the ALMANAC, “Patrick O'Toole, who earns $154,500 this school year, said he was prepared to take a pay freeze as well.”
Didn’t Posti state that the research on whether the anonymous pledge toward the feasibility study was tax deductible would be concluded in a week? Whatever happened with that, did anyone hear? There was a good bit of media hype about it but where is the follow up information?
-Wilma Zellers
Wilma, devoted wife of William Zellers, Mt. Lebanon resident and noted author, I was thinking the same thing. I guess I have to submit a Right To Know which costs the district up to $2600, instead getting a Nice To Know, which is free.
Elaine
Wilma, do you know how many years O'Toole has been a superintendent vs. Steinhauer?
Andy Bachman
The solution to every government - board - problem is to spend more money -even if the money belongs to the Municipality.
What the Commissioners don't know is the USC Board cut the athletic budget because the Municipality would pick up the slack. I was told this by a long-serving USC Board member.
When the bottom half of the budget cuts are released the Commissioners will have egg on their face if they build fields for the District and MLSD cuts the athletic budget. If the Commissioners build a new field in Robb Hollow Park they will have one more uncared for field that is not up to the standards of certain dishonest parents. If they Turf Mellon there will be no money to replace the turf in ten years and the Board will have an individual personal liability issue over a safety problem called concussions. The NFL has committed $100,000,000 to concussion research and the Board and Commissioners are running head first into the concussion problem.
Those athletic cuts will happen if the grievance is related to a court ruling I am thinking about. But I'll hold back on that part of the law.
John
Andy,
It appears that O'Toole has been a super for approx. 9 years and USC is his second career appointment while Steinhauer has been a super for 2, his first experience being Mt. Lebanon.
-Wilma Zellers
Wilma, from what I understand, we were forced to go with someone with no experience as a super. Word on the street was that we were burning through supers left and right. Remember when Posti was interviewed recently and the subject was superintendent buyouts? I posted this quote, "According to Posti, these restrictions will limit the potential candidates school districts can attract, and will hurt a school district’s chances of landing a top-tier superintendent." It seems as though we couldn't land a top-tier superintendent. Now, he is being paid close to what the PA Superintendent of the Year is making. We haven't heard Tim or Jan, for that matter, saying anything about taking pay freezes, have you? They just want to eliminate a community service coordinator. When Tim gets his raise this summer, the students will be on summer vacation. No chance for an uprise then.
Elaine
But, does USC super O'Toole lunch with the kiddies for feedback on district operations?
A good CEO can never overestimate the value of customer feedback, unless of course it happens to be in the form of a petition from residents, students or studies by architects and structural engineers.
Andy Bachman
Elaine,
It sure is ironic that the very restriction that Posti complained about wasn’t in place during the recruitment of our most recent super, yet the Board didn’t recruit an experienced one.
I haven’t heard anything about wage freeze offers either and I not going to hold my breath waiting. It’s clearly an “every man for himself” culture in the school district, unlike USC, and the women (Mrs. Kolko) and children (students) sure aren’t getting into the titanic lifeboats first.
-Wilma
Wilma,
Lifeboats for only older children. Bill Hook
During the budget discussion it was clear that the Board was unaware of the potential recurring costs should the grievance be decided in favor of the teachers’ union. This would be devastating to future budgets but of course; as resources to support the students are stripped away to pay the teachers we’ll have to remember, “it’s for the kids”.
Wasn’t there concern among residents that the last contract was too generous given economic conditions? Well, since the Board and administration supported it, what are they thinking now that they have been slapped with a potential costly grievance?
So much for the relationship building between the municipality and school district, one of the “solutions” is to increase rental rates to the municipality – great thinking there. (Rob Peter to pay Paul much? – it all comes out of our pockets.) Obviously there is frustration about wanting reduced permit fees from the municipality.
Here’s a question: is there any way to find out what exactly has been spent on the high school renovation so far – ALL invoices and expenses including the legal fees incurred when suing the municipality? Any snow removal costs for the Lutheran Church lot? Additional crossing guards? How about that feasibility study – is that part of the project cost? Given the first bond issue of $69M, it would be good to know how much of it has been spent to this point and how much expense is left for the project. Would a RTK really tell me what I have a right to know?
-Wilma Zellers
Wilma, I have been at school board meetings when residents asked how much had been spent up to that point. Jan Klein was able to answer them without a RTK being filed.
What about the tennis courts? Are we renting courts somewhere? Is that another hidden cost?
Elaine
Remember the financial mess in the York City School District? Some folks want the State to clean up their mess for them. Here is a quote from the York County Dispatch:
Some York County lawmakers said they are joining a civil lawsuit by a Monroe County lawmaker suing the state over its education funding formula.
Reps. Keith Gillespie and Will Tallman, both Republicans, said they and other county lawmakers are fed up with how school districts are funded.
The formula, which provides districts with their basic educating funding, uses 1991 census data to figure out how much money to give each district.
Districts that have grown since that time - particularly many in York County - are still getting the same share of funding they did two decades ago, while slow-growing urban districts are getting more per student, the lawmakers said
http://www.yorkdispatch.com/news/ci_20277524/york-area-lawmakers-joining-lawsuit-reform-education-funding
Mount Lebanon’s birth rate peaked in 1990. If York wins this lawsuit will Lebo get less State aid because our number of students has declined? Will our District increase legal fees to file a Brief opposing this lawsuit?
John
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