North Little Rock School District leaders are putting some $2.45 million in jobs and services on the chopping block for the coming school year and an additional $2.23 million for the following school year in preparation for the loss of state desegregation aid.

The School Board for the 9,113-student system won't finalize the 2014-15 budget until August or September, but already the district has taken steps to eliminate two dozen jobs -- 11 certified and 13 support staff. They include at least three administrative jobs with salary packages in excess of $100,000 and two others each with benefits in excess of $60,000. There are additional supervisors who will see their salaries reduced.

And it's not employee positions alone that are affected, North Little Rock Superintendent Kelly Rodgers said last week.

Other money-saving measures include the previously announced closing of Lynch Drive Elementary for next year, the immediate use of a 10-hour-a-day, four-day-a-week summer work schedule to save on utilities, the embedding of what was an oral communications course into 10th grade English classes, the elimination of a driver's education program, and an end to the use of early-morning school aides.

The district's school bus service is an area officials will look to for savings this year and into the future. Holiday pay for newly hired bus drivers is on the list of cuts for this year. The number of work days per year for employees, particularly new hires, is also targeted.

"It's going to be tough for a few years here in North Little Rock," Rodgers said. "We are going to have to make some tough decisions."

The district, which has an annual operating budget of about $115 million excluding earmarked federal funds, is trying to offset the loss of as much as $7.6 million a year in state desegregation aid that will occur after the 2017-18 school year. The special aid, paid to the district for two decades, will end per an agreement reached last year with the state and approved by a federal judge in January.

"We have to figure out how to cut $7.6 million over a 3- or 4-year period," Rodgers said. "We can't do it all at once. We'll do it in increments."

Rodgers met in recent weeks with principals and other administrators to identify the possible cuts for the next four years. The results are contained on a six-page spreadsheet. The list of cuts for years one and two are more defined than the next two years. And year one of the cuts is more settled than year two, Rodgers said.

"We tried to stay away from instruction as much as possible," Rodgers said. "Some of the programs that are proposed for cutting right away may be programs that principals said they don't use very much."

That may not be the case about academic programs in subsequent years.

"In terms of programs, it will be easier to cut programs this first year than it will be for the next year," Rodgers said.

On top of compensating for the desegregation money, the district is also adjusting for the loss of $336,000 a year in local property tax revenue.

A Pulaski County assessor's office error had some Pulaski County Special School District tax revenue going to the North Little Rock district.

The North Little Rock district will have to make do without the misdirected revenue -- and it anticipates repaying the Pulaski County Special district for the past erroneous distributions.

The district also is in the midst of a capital improvement program that will reduce the district's 21 campuses to 13, almost all of which will be built anew or extensively renovated.

The $265.5 million in new and renovated buildings are funded by a combination of bond issues financed by a 2012 tax increase, state Partnership Program building funds and about $8.3 million in savings from the district's operating budget. That is being addressed largely through savings realized by the early closing of some campuses, such as Bellwood Elementary and the Argenta Academy.

"Money for capital improvements was already in the plan," Rodgers said. "But the desegregation money going away -- that just occurred this year. The focus of the planning right now is to make sure we stay on track with the capital improvement plan."

Among the positions cut this spring were the directors of federal programs, information services, and communications, as well as a transportation supervisor, the district's webmaster and a secondary literacy facilitator.

The district is eliminating a high school counselor position, a data technician job and some central office secretary jobs.

And there are no plans to replace a high school business teacher, nor an English teacher or a drama teacher. Positions for an elementary art teacher, a middle school science teacher and a bookkeeper will also go wanting.

Rodgers said that parents will likely see the changes in bus service more than the other immediate cuts. Those changes will include, over time, combining bus and reducing bus routes as the result of a diminished number of students participating in interdistrict transfer programs and redesigned elementary school attendance zones. More compact elementary school attendance zones and a greater ability to walk to school are also expected by district officials to reduce costs.

The superintendent who is completing his first year on the job said he is confident that the district can operate effectively with the cuts already made or proposed for the coming school year. As for the coming years the district will use information from a board-authorized staffing audit.

"We want to make sure we are being efficient and cutting and reducing in the places for the future that won't affect instruction."

Gregg Thompson, the district's executive director for human resources, presented to the School Board on Thursday a plan for that staff study.

Tatia Prieto, project manager for Prismatic Services Inc. of Huntersville, N.C., described for the board the process that will be used to gather data about the district and interview staff, particularly those with staff-related scheduling responsibilities.

"Every organization is unique and we want to understand what is driving what we see," Prieto said. "We pride ourselves on being collaborative. We are not a consulting agency that says, 'Gotcha. This is what you are doing wrong.' We hope that this will be a collaborative process where we will all agree that this is the direction we need to go, whatever the direction is."

The study, to be completed by the end of 2014 at a cost of about $22,000, will focus on school staffing standards used in the district and the outcome of those standards.

"Sometimes we find that you may have thought you were allocating staff positions based on certain criteria, but when it is played out you may not be adhering to your own standards," Prieto said.

"We'll be looking at the organization at the central office," she added. "Are we the right shape? Are we the right size? Do we have all the right boxes on the organizational chart? Maybe this one box here should be two boxes. We'll make those kinds of recommendations."

At the school level, the study will look at the average teacher load by school.

"The average teacher load may turn out to be much less than at another school. We may want to talk to you about how to make it more fair."

Metro on 06/23/2014