2013-04-15 PPS School Board Meeting
| District | Portland Public Schools |
|---|---|
| Date | 2013-04-15 |
| Time | missing |
| Venue | missing |
| Meeting Type | missing |
| Directors Present | missing |
Documents / Media
Notices/Agendas
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04-15-13 Business Agenda (d4bd2f957cbaab16).pdf Meeting Materials
Minutes
Transcripts
Event 1: Board of Education - Superintendent's Budget Message - April 25, 2013
00h 00m 00s
good evening I'd like to welcome
everybody the special meeting of the
Budget Committee of the board of
education for April 15 2013 we are now
called to order I'd like to extend a
special warm welcome to everyone present
and to our television viewers this
meeting is being televised live and will
be replayed throughout the next two
weeks please check the board website for
replay times you can also find it online
on their website interpreters are
available if they would please come up
at this time and let folks know where to
find them if they're in need of services
thank you I just like to note the
director Regan is expecting to join us
as she gets here a little bit late we
are now convened as the budget committee
and the purpose of our initial budget
committee meeting is to receive the
superintendent's bus at budget message
and receive the budget document Budget
Committee will not discuss or entertain
public testimony on the proposed budget
at this time public testimony if you
would like to share it with us and we
would love to hear your input on the
proposed budget will be taken this
Thursday April eighteenth at six o'clock
p.m. in the wilson high school cafeteria
and again then again on may first at 6pm
here in the board auditorium again we'd
like to encourage folks to sign up in
advance if they wish testify and please
contact the board office if you'd like
to tonight is the first time the
superintendent is presenting us with a
budget and to clarify we're just simply
receiving the budget message tonight
while this is not the time for the board
to engage in discussion or ask questions
there will be a specific process for
board members parents and community
members and staff to voice their support
and concerns with that superintendent
Smith would you please present us with
your budget message and your proposed
budget
so you have in front of you a proposed
budget document which i'm officially
presenting to you tonight co-chairs
Belisle and gonzalez members of the
school board tonight I'm proposing a 487
million dollar general fund budget for
Portland Public Schools for the 2013-14
school year this proposal marks a
pivotal moment for Portland schools
within this budget we have prioritized
strategies to raise student achievement
that align with our milestones
achievement compact and strategic
framework and the racial educational
equity policy and equity plan we remain
focused on how to invest strategically
and anchor ourselves in our vision for
20-25 this is when our current
kindergartners graduate from high school
and it is the year that the state's
ambitious 4040 20-goal aims dab all
Oregon students completing high school
and eighty percent attaining
post-secondary credentials I want to
start this busted budget message by
saying thank you the city our community
our families our partners and our staff
have stepped up over and over again to
support our schools and our students
this year we're at a turning point in
funding for schools in the state of
Oregon since the passage of the property
tax limitation measure 5 we have faced
two decades of reductions for the past
four years we have cut tens of millions
of dollars each year as we navigated the
worst recession that our state and our
nation have endured in nearly a century
since 2009 state education funding has
been reduced by more than half a billion
dollars at the same time as costs have
continued to increase this budget checks
the erosion of programming that is
shadowed our current students nearly
every year that they have attended
school for the first time in more than
ten years state leaders have proposed to
stabilize education funding and increase
the share of the state budget that k-12
schools receive their proposed 6.75
billion dollar level of support to k-12
schools in Oregon which this budget is
based on provides Portland with relative
funding stability over the coming two
years this budget is not one of across
the
board cuts like previous years but some
schools and departments will see
reductions and resources because of
changes in student numbers loss of
federal or grant funding or decisions we
are making about how to allocate
resources stable does not equal adequate
00h 05m 00s
as we face continued budget constraints
we have prioritized the mitigation of
losses and the differentiation of
funding based on student need I applaud
Governor John Kitzhaber and legislative
leaders for their efforts to meet the
demonstrated need for stable funding of
our schools this is a step in the right
direction the governor's three biennium
plan for reinvesting in education is
hopeful with the next biennium seeing
actual reinvestment in education in our
state we hope in addition to the
stability from the state our voters
approved an increase in our local option
levy and a city tax to put art teachers
in our k 5 and k-8 schools last year we
were able to reach a one-time agreement
between the city our teachers
association and the district that
protected 110 teaching positions these
tremendous investments from our
community have allowed us to keep
teachers in the classroom and maintain a
full school year when many other
districts have been laying off teachers
and cutting days the voters also
approved a 482 million dollar school
bond that will let us create 21st
century school buildings in order to
support the future of this great city it
is through these investments and
tremendous partnerships and support that
I'm able to say that our overall general
fund budget will be relatively stable
for the first time since I became
superintendent six years ago however
even with the difficult steps being
taken to offer this level of funding
from the state no one should Harbor the
illusion that Portland public schools or
districts across Oregon will be well
funded for the 13-14 school year as I
went to listening sessions around the
district and received results of our
online survey I heard about important
programs that our community wants to see
in our schools a student at Roosevelt
told me about how he loved his ninth
grade academy and the support it
provided him but missed that support as
he progressed into 10th grade 11th grade
finally now as a senior a parent at the
community listening session at Lincoln
talked about needing additional supports
for her student in special education and
a teacher at the Portland association of
teachers representative assembly I
attended reinforced again and again the
importance of caring adult relationships
to accelerate student achievement that's
the consistent a message across every
constituent group this budget does not
get us all that we need nor does it
replace all that we have lost in the
future we want to see all Oregon move
toward full funding of the quality
education model which establishes
benchmarks for high-quality k-12
education and the level of state funding
required to support it Oregon will not
meet its 40 40 20 goal by simply
maintaining a no cuts level of funding
stability over the long term we know
that Congress is inability to avoid
automatic across-the-board budget cuts
known as sequestration will cost
Portland Public Schools more than 2.5
million dollars in federal funds that
support some of our most vulnerable and
underserved populations special
education head start English as a Second
Language and title one our funding for
students on free and reduced-price meals
the impact of education specific
sequestration cuts will be felt in PPS
as early as June of 2013 in addition we
have a number of grants that are
expiring in many cases these funds have
been used to provide critically needed
programs and services to develop new
capacity for PPS such as the avid
program what does all of this mean for
PPS it means that this budget does not
offer us the ability to build back lost
programs reduce class sizes or shield
schools from enrollment direct dips for
too many school communities this budget
echoes cuts from previous years while
enrollment continues to increase for PPS
as a whole some schools will have fewer
students next year and therefore fewer
teachers however because of the hard
work at the state and in this
community's investment this budget
allows us to sustain important programs
that are working for students it also
allows us modest but important
opportunities to make targeted in bed
assessments to accelerate our recent
gains across our student achievement
milestones I'm encouraged to present you
in our community with a proposed budget
that does the following ad 66 staff
positions to our schools in the general
fund which will impart mitigate the
impact of losses from federal
sequestration cuts and sunsetting grants
it makes targeted investments to
accelerate gains in our graduation rates
supports early literacy and increases
student achievement among historically
underserved students preserves effective
programs also threatened by expiring
grants and federal sequestration cuts
reinvest 3.3 million in savings from
operational investments and efficiencies
back into educational programs while
maintaining support for school building
care it differentiates resources to
00h 10m 00s
target supports for our historically
underserved populations in alignment
with our racial educational equity
policy it aligns with the board's
commitment to building an employee
compensation policy and structure that
both appropriately reflects the
marketplace and the caliber of talent
that we as a district want to retain and
attract this budget specifically
prioritizes this investment for our
school leaders and finally this does not
draw from the school districts reserves
to balance the budget and maintains our
current level of reserves which is a
significant just measure of exactly the
point we are with this budget this
budget proposal reflects a continuing
commitment to the vision and strategic
priority framework that has guided our
work as a district we want every student
every teacher and every school to
succeed we want to prepare every student
well for the next level in his or her
education so that all students
regardless of race class or zip code
compete complete school ready for
college career and able to make positive
contributions to our community we want
to support effective educators offer
rigorous and relevant programs provide
individual supports to our students and
foster strong partnerships with families
and community
this focus has served us well our
schools have produced overall gains and
our milestones despite the financial
hardships of sustained budget reductions
the four-year graduation rate in PBS has
increased 10 percentage points since two
thousand eight nine the percentage of
students who are ready reading to learn
by the end of third grade has increased
by at least four percentage points each
of the past three years the percentage
of 10th grade students who are on track
to graduate has increased every year the
achievement and opportunity gap between
white students and students of color has
narrowed at key grades and subjects and
district district wide the gap and
graduation rates between white students
and african-american and Latino students
has narrowed this year at the same time
as graduation rates went up for white
students that gap was dramatically
narrowed and even closed for many racial
groups at comprehensive high schools
such as Franklin Grant Lincoln Roosevelt
and Wilson despite deep cuts to our
operational support departments in the
last four years PBS has made a number of
targeted investments and utilized
effective business practices to produce
efficiencies these savings have allowed
us to direct additional resources back
into our educational programs and
maintain our school facilities our
project to convert the district's
remaining 89 oil-burning boilers at 47
different schools to cleaner and less
costly natural gas burners was projected
to save more than 1.8 million in fuel
costs the this year this past summer we
completed the first round of conversions
at 33 schools and we're exceeding
expectations for savings which allows us
to reduce our utilities budget by an
additional six hundred thousand dollars
in the coming year for a total of 2.1
million dollars per year going forward
I'm just going to say Yahoo
that's a big deal in order to manage the
cost of custodial overtime eight
additional full-time custodians were
hired to cover the hours created by
absences this efficiency saved forty
thousand dollars even after the cost of
adding the additional eight full-time
equivalent custodians this is another
great one a new transportation contract
resulted in a net savings of six hundred
and seventy thousand dollars in propane
costs which will be which will be
reflected in the 2013-14 budget over the
last few years the Transportation
Department has also been working with
special education to reduce the number
of students who are transported by cabs
through this reduction in purchase
transportation services the
Transportation Department is saving an
additional hundred and eighty thousand
dollars in 2009 PPS completed the first
large-scale solar roofing project
undertaken by a public school district
in Oregon when we fix leaking roofs at
nine schools and installed 5565 solar
photovoltaic thin-film modules as a
result of this work we received an
energy rebate of approximately 1.2
million dollars these funds can be used
to finance facilities capital
expenditures in 2013-14 and relieve
costs to the general fund through a
partnership with Multnomah County for
purchasing paper and improved processes
our print shop save two hundred thousand
dollars for the general fund and in
addition IT has phased out some software
maintenance agreements and implemented
newer applications with lower annual
maintenance costs saving the school
district approximately two hundred and
eighty-five thousand dollars our finance
departments have made reductions of over
00h 15m 00s
three hundred thousand dollars by
reorganizing to eliminate positions
reduce overtime and payroll after a
software system upgrade and reducing non
personnel expenses and then finally in
addition to the 3.3 million in
operational savings that are being
redirected we have general fund dollars
that have been used to finance several
debt service requirements through
transfers to other funds we've paid off
one such debt in 2012-13 and are making
a final reduce
payment on the custodian settlement debt
in 2013-14 the cost to the general fund
for this debt service will read be
reduced by 4 million dollars in this
proposed budget so I'm just going to say
those are all really significant impacts
on the revenue we have to work with to
provide services to kids so I'm going to
just stop for a minute every year our
biggest investment is in the people who
support our students and Families I
heard across all stakeholder groups that
the top priority for this budget was to
get more adults in schools working with
our students I am proposing a net
increase of 66 FTE and the general fund
for schools which in part offsets the
impact of reductions in grants and
federal funding staffing in our schools
for 2013-14 is based on the following
the projected student enrollment an
equity formula allocation the new arts
tax and additional supports for focus
and priority schools and for high
schools in addition we're increasing our
maintenance of effort of in special
education by more than 2 million dollars
we also this next year expected decrease
of students identified for english as a
second language services all of which
impact our staffing in keeping with
previous year's socioeconomic status or
SES allocation we are providing a
portion four percent of the staffing
ratio to schools with high percentages
of students on free or reduced-price
meals as title 1 funds have decreased
and we limited the number of schools
receiving those funds this SES
allocation has provided key resources to
schools such as saban which no longer
receive title 1 funds to sustain the
strategies that have led to gains in
student achievement it's also clear from
our data that students in poverty are
not the only students we need to target
for resources and services in our line
in alignment with our racial educational
equity policy and our milestone and
achievement compact targets I am also
allocating another four percent of the
staffing ratio to schools with a high
percentage of historically underserved
students the combined historically
unders
measure is defined by the state of
Oregon in our achievement compact as
students from one of the four
historically underserved racial groups
black Latino Native American and Pacific
Islander students who qualify for
special education services students who
are eligible for free or reduced-price
meals students who qualify for english
as a second language services this new
allocation differentiates resources to
schools to address closing the
achievement and opportunity gap for our
historically underserved students we
have set ambitious targets for all of
our students and we must resource
schools to fund the strategies and the
supports needed to ensure that all
students succeed these equity
allocations are an important investment
toward those goals thanks to the voters
of the city the arts tax will fund 45.5
arts teachers in RK 5 and k-8 schools
ensuring that every student has access
to visual arts dance music or theater in
grades K through 5 research has
demonstrated the academic benefits for
students who participate in the arts we
know that across the country there has
been a persistently inequitable
distribution of Arts and schools our
city has helped to eliminate this gap in
service we want to thank you once again
so I'm going to just do a call our city
we've also allocated 20.25 FTE to
support those schools identified by the
Oregon Department of Education as
priority and focus schools these schools
are identified as the lowest performing
five percent and fifteen percent of
title one schools in the state
respectively we are requiring that these
targeted FTE must be used to provide
school-wide support in specific ways
that have proven successful in our own
schools and in schools nationwide
examples include capacity building for
example reading specialists and
provision of social emotional supports
for example counselors and school social
workers so we're being directive with
how that FTE is used we're also
directing support toward early learners
while we've seen important gains on our
third grade our third grade milestone
we've now set an ambitious goal of a
hundred percent of
this year's kindergarteners reading to
00h 20m 00s
learn by the end of third grade in 2016
the significance of this goal was
reinforced in our student listening
session where a high school student
talked about how important it is to be
on track in reading in the early grades
because once students fall behind it is
extremely challenging to catch up in
this year's budget we continue to
prioritize a number of key strategic
investments to accelerate this work as
well as preserve our investment in
effective early learner programs in the
face of federal cuts we maintained our
commitment to full-day kindergarten by
preserving almost 5 million dollars of
funding in title one schools for the
second half of the day that is not
funded by the state we maintained our
commitment to target kindergarten class
sizes of 25 or fewer through a separate
staffing allocation for kindergarten and
by providing additional staffing
capacity set aside to respond to
unexpected increases in kindergarten
enrollment in the fall we have
prioritized k3 literacy and English
language development in the upcoming
language arts curriculum materials
adoption we are committing 1 million
dollars to these two areas two hundred
thousand dollars in this budget and
eight hundred thousand dollars in the
2014-15 budget in order to complete that
adoption for the early grades and this
is really a k-12 adoption of which we're
prioritizing the early grades as the
piece will implement immediately we will
expand our early kindergarten transition
program to all nine priority and focus
schools and preserve the program by
moving its funding from title one into
the general fund and you recently heard
about this program where students are
practicing kindergarten during the
summer highly successful so this will
now be in all of our focus in priority
schools will preserve funding for key
early learning programs such as head
start pre-kindergarten and the SIA
program to support literacy for Latino
families and that remains with title one
at the community listening sessions
students and parents have been clear
that the cuts we've taken in our high
schools have been felt deeply state
funding cuts have increased staffing
ratios at all grade levels over the last
four years but the impact of these cuts
has been compounded in our high school
system by demographic wave of declining
enrollment that is making its way
through the system and reaching the high
school grades two years ago we changed
to an eighth period high school schedule
which is common in Oregon school
districts in order to staff schools more
efficiently and mitigate the pressures
of reduced funding that strategy enabled
every high school to preserve programs
and protect class sizes even with the
reduction of 45 FTE that year today high
schools are able to offer as many class
sections as they did three years ago and
students on average are taking more
classes I have heard from many high
school parents and students about their
frustration over student schedules PBS
is constrained by an arbitrator's
decision that limits the number of
classes most students can take 27 the
only exceptions to the arbitrator's
ruling our academic priority students
and students receiving special education
services we have requested that the
arbitrator reconsider this decision and
what can you continue to advocate for
the ability to offer all of our students
a full schedule this is one that's a
topic of great concern in every
conversation I've been and out on the
budget listening sessions many grants
and federal funds that have been used to
support high school initiatives or sun
setting reduced or unstable these
include our voluntary public school
choice grant school improvement grant at
Roosevelt High School the foreign
language acquisition grant small
learning community grant title to a
funds for professional development which
are being reduced title one supports for
students on free and reduced-price meals
being reduced at a high school
graduation initiative grant which is
uncertain because it's tied up in the
federal conversation this budget
proposal continues to mitigate some of
the cuts we previously took in high
schools as well as the reductions
associated with the loss of federal
funding and grants by investing 35
additional FTE to specifically support
high schools above the general school
staffing formula this investment
includes the addition of one FTE of
directed support to each of our 9
community comprehensive and focus high
schools to improve our graduation rate
by supplementing existing resources for
career learning or helping students meet
essential skill requirements for
graduation there's also a dedicated
set-aside of 10 ft
e that will be allocated in the future
so did not go out with the enrollment
forecast that's that have already been
will be distributed tomorrow morning the
but will be allocated to help high
schools mitigate problems caused by
changes in enrollment and support access
to the core high school program we're
providing additional support to our
focus on priority high schools roosevelt
with 3 FTE and Jefferson with 2.25 FTE
to sustain the gains they're making and
their graduation rates the high school
system reforms that the school board
approved two years ago have improved our
graduation rate and other measures we
00h 25m 00s
need to sustain and accelerate these
games earlier this year we outlined a
comprehensive set of recommendations to
broaden and deepen reforms in our high
school system and step up the pace of
improvement in alignment with our
milestones and the state's 40 40 20
goals we committed to expand
opportunities to keep students on track
toward a diploma have access to rigorous
and culturally responsive programs
engage in career related learning and
earn college credit while they're in
high school this budget includes a
number of targeted investments within
the constraints of our high school
staffing allocation that are designed to
address these recommendations and
accelerate the pace of our graduation
rate gains key elements of these
investments include at our focus high
schools we maintain the commitment of
additional FTE to support specialized
program requirements at Benson for
career learning and at Jefferson for the
middle college program we have continued
the support for the coordination of the
avid program in the general fund next
year to replace the expiring voluntary
public school choice grant avid helps
first-generation college going students
prepare for post-secondary success at
our budget listening sessions many many
students told me about how avid helped
them become motivated and confident
about College we're prioritizing credit
recovery opportunities for students who
are not meeting the 10th grade on track
to graduate benchmark and we're adding
general fund support for Summer Scholars
which was previously funded by through
voluntary public school choice a grant
which is going away
we are maintaining contracts with
cultural responsive partner
organisations such as sei and step up
that are provided values of valuable
support to our students and maintaining
our son schools to continue to support
students outside the school day
continuing to support the college-going
culture in our high schools through the
senior inquiry program at both Jefferson
and Roosevelt maintaining our financial
commitment to support students in
completing high school in programs
operated by our community-based partners
we are continuing work that's already
underway to ensure that students are
placed in the most rigorous and
challenging programs for high school
completion and will support an intensive
study commissioned this year to identify
student academic academic needs by age
and credits so that we can provide all
students with the most competitive
credential that they can attain and as
you know we're continuing the support
for the youth pass program through our
partnership with TriMet in the city this
program provides trimet bus passes to
all PPS high school students to ensure
access to school and internships as well
as building a generation of public
transportation advocates over the course
of the next year we'll work with our
partners on this initiative to identify
sustainable funding we are creating a
coordinator position to continue to grow
our successful reconnection services
which has grown exponentially and
increase our capacity to work with our
community partners onry kinetic
reconnecting disconnected youth in
online blended learning we are
committing to the next phase of
investment to expand our capacity for
credit recovery by adding highly
qualified ll special ed and math
teachers we are also adding funds for
materials and professional development
which will be matched by funds from a
grant with Mount Hood regulatory
commission and finally we are developing
a new district-wide program called the
portland international scholars academy
or pisa this program will be for
students in grades 9 through 12 or new
to PPS and who have limited proficiency
in English this program seeks to build
on the strengths of our emerging
bilingual students and support those
students to graduate we owe be
developing this program in partnership
with the international refugee center of
Oregon or
go and it will be housed at one of our
home high schools later this month we're
launching our high school action team
that includes stakeholders from across
our high school system and community
this team will make recommendations to
further the goals of high school system
design around content and instructional
changes to accelerate student
achievement and graduation success
within the framework established in high
school system design we know that
effective school leadership and teachers
are the highest leverage strategies we
have for raising achievement for all
students and closing the achievement and
opportunity gap for our students of
color our effective educators strategic
priority focuses on supporting
principals and teachers and developing
their professional practice and
relationships with students in order to
accelerate student learning students
tell us that is the relationships they
have with their teachers that both
inspire their love of learning and keeps
them engaged in the classroom in
response to teacher and principal input
and in alignment with best practice
research we are adjusting our
professional development model to better
support teachers and their work for
students this will include expanding the
teacher mentor program for new teachers
where an experienced teacher is released
from teaching for three years and works
with 15 new teachers to support their
00h 30m 00s
professional development and a non
evaluative setting we plan to expand
this effective program by funding
additional mentors next year continuing
to emphasize our work in culturally
responsive instruction and assessment
through professional development and
school teams focused specifically on
closing our racial achievement and
opportunity gaps leveraging our very
effective peer coaching and mentor model
beyond new teachers to provide
experienced teachers with the collegial
critical partnership with a mentor and
coach to continue to fine-tune their
craft and service to students and
finally offering professional
development and a variety of flexible
learning platforms that include webinars
blended learning full-day professional
development on district initiatives and
site based professional learning when
requested we are also continuing to
provide budget support for our
evaluation work groups on teacher and
principal effectiveness these teams are
working to develop implement calibrate
and refine how our evaluation tools
align with
Senate bill to 90s requirement to
include student growth as a factor in
evaluation I I am hopeful that we'll
continue to work collaboratively with
the Portland association of teachers in
these and other work groups to identify
strategies and opportunities to ensure
that all students receive culturally
responsive instruction we've seen
exciting gains in student achievement
over the last few years and it's
imperative that we continue to focus on
raising achievement for all students
because we are not yet where we need to
be this means we will continue to have
equity at the center of everything we do
the racial educational equity policy
identifies equity goals for PPS and
recognizes that we will need to
differentiate resources and services in
order to meet those targets as outlined
in our equity plan we will continue to
support the professional development of
our board staff across all schools and
the central office to enhance our
culturally responsive practice and
decision making at all levels of the
organization develop an affirmative
action policy and implementation plan
provide resources to support the
implementation of the Jefferson
enrollment balancing process revise the
enrollment and transfer policy to align
with the racial educational equity
policy and maintain our investment in
our family engagement staff and continue
to contract with culturally specific
community-based organizations PBS has a
persistent challenge of over
representation and exclusion of students
of color and student discipline I'm
including funding for a third party
hearings officer to improve disciplinary
consistency across the district and to
allow our principals to continue to sir
play a different role in disciplinary
situations where they are able to serve
as advocates for students rather than
the discipline decider we will also
expand effective prevention strategies
such as restorative justice to continue
to eliminate disparities in our
discipline outcomes dual language
immersion programs provide opportunities
for students in particular are emerging
bilingual students to gain access to a
language development and curricular
experience in this proposed budget we
are continuing to build this capacity
says our Chavez will add a second
spanish immersion kindergarten class
which will
double the size of that program over
time it's got the Spanish dual language
program will now include kindergarten
and first grade at Lane middle school
the first class of students from Kelly's
Russian program will join us sixth
graders and over the next year we will
be planning for two new dual language
immersion programs to begin in 2014-15
one Spanish Dual Immersion and the other
world language which is still to be
confirmed as you know we have balanced
our budget over the past several years
by asking our employees to make
sacrifices and compensation earlier this
year when approving my contract the
board acknowledged and quote staff
members throughout PPS have forgone
raises for years pen this year also took
furloughs in order to preserve a full
school year and our classroom staff we
both deeply appreciate this commitment
and sacrifice and at the same time
recognize that this is not a sustainable
long-term strategy we need to be able to
offer competitive salaries in order to
attract and retain the best talent to
serve our students end quote in the last
two years no employees receive
cost-of-living increases and only bus
drivers a tu and teachers p80 received
partial or whole step increases in both
years and our classified employees PFS p
received a step in 2010-11 this year
teachers delayed their step increase
until January and all non represented
groups took a pay cut in the form of
furlough days ranging from 3 days for
school leaders to 6 or 10 days for
central office employees in order to
help fund the one-time agreement with
the city the district and p80 that
preserved 110 positions in our schools
in the last five years are non
represented staff including our
00h 35m 00s
principals received a single two percent
cost-of-living increase in 2010-11 for
2013-14 we have already reached
agreements with a tu dcu and seiu there
are modest increases included in all of
these agreements contracts with p80 and
PFS p expire on june thirtieth 2013 and
we are in the process of negotiating new
agreements with them
in order to continue to recruit and
retain strong principles I have proposed
a new salary schedule for school leaders
based upon a comparison with other
school districts in the Portland metro
area that brings us back in line with
the market over the next two years the
average increase under this proposal is
three-point-three percent we are also
continuing to further strengthen the
alignment of our principal evaluation
tool with Senate bill 290 and our racial
educational equity policy in this budget
I've also included a step increase for
other non represented employees some
director level positions or on salary
grades that do not include steps for
these employees this budget includes a
2% salary increase one reflection of the
relative relative stability that I
described at the beginning of this
message is that PPS is not using
reserves to balance this year's budget
nor is the district adding to reserves
in the current fiscal climate in this
budget the district maintains reserves
in the form of an operating contingency
of 20 point seven million or four point
one percent of expenditures which is
consistent with the current year the
only change to contingency compared to
forecasted beginning fund balance is a
small transfer out of the specific
reserved for capital work on one of the
grape fields projects all of the benefit
from the Legislature's commitment to
k-12 education in the upcoming biennium
will be invested in staff programs and
services not used to increase reserves
risks and uncertainties and there are a
few in the budget I am proposing to you
the state legislature has not yet
approved the appropriation for k-12
education so the six point seven five
billion that we've assumed in this
budget is still a work in progress we
also know that the purses in tax
expenditure reform that the co-chairs
budget is based on are not certain to be
adopted that could have a dramatic
impact on Portland's budget for PPS the
difference between state funding at a
level of six point seven five billion
and a six point five five billion state
budget is eight million for our district
it's the difference between making and
maintaining the investments I've
described and that
at Portland students or another two
years of further cuts and fewer programs
for our students in schools similarly if
the legislature comes closer to their
targeted glide path to the quality
education model of 6.8 95 billion we
would be in a position to add more staff
to our schools this budget includes
mitigation of some of the 2.5 million in
program cuts brought on by federal
sequestration I want to applaud our US
senators and our congressional
delegation who've been working hard to
stop these cuts I'm deeply worried that
federal sequestration reductions could
be even more damaging to future budgets
finally our school staffing formula
anticipates 4.5 million from the arts
tax revenue collection is too low or
their significant changes that reduce
the funds pass-through to PPS this would
mean fewer teachers in our schools
assuming that the state legislature
funds k-12 education at the equivalent
of the six point seven five billion
proposed by leadership this budget
represents a year of relative stability
for Portland after years of reductions
and we are in a very different place
than many school districts across Oregon
where 6.75 billion still means millions
of dollars of cuts however this is still
not an investment budget many schools
will still face cuts some schools may be
losing a grant funded program that
worked to improve student achievement or
face the loss of teaching positions
because of fewer students in their
school as a system even in our years of
greatest resource scarcity we have seen
student achievement gains and a
narrowing of the achievement and
opportunity gap we have seen these gains
because we've prioritized our limited
funding towards high leverage strategies
and made smart operational decisions in
every budget we have consistently
informed those investments by
maintaining a focus on our student
achievement milestones targeting our
limited funds to accelerate student
achievement keeping equity at the center
of our decision making at every budget
listening session I heard how much these
cuts have affected our students and
educators and this budget will not
replace all that we've lost but it
allows it has allowed us to mitigate
other reductions in a number of places
including our high schools it has also
allowed us to continue to better align
our practices and restore
with our student achievement goals and
the racial educational equity policy in
the coming years our priority is not
just to avoid cuts but to invest in
programs that support students and in
00h 40m 00s
strategies that work with additional
funds our schools could expand effective
interventions that are helping to narrow
the achievement and opportunity gap for
our most underserved students including
students of color hire additional
teachers to stabilize or reduce class
sizes restore key programs and electives
such as full-time library and PE on
elementary schools offer high school
students more classes and increase
access to career learning education fund
full-day kindergarten and expand early
learning opportunities and restore
classroom assistants and school support
staff and this is the wish list you
heard in every budget listening session
and more but people just hungry for what
we want to build back these investments
will only be possible if our governor
and legislative leaders continue to make
schools their top priority and future
legislative sessions we will be counting
on their continued leadership the future
is promising for Portland Public Schools
we've continued to make gains toward all
of our milestones despite years of
budget cuts we have aligned our
milestones and strategic framework with
our local and state partners and
identified academic strategies that we
know are working and we are just
beginning to build the school facilities
of the future thanks to Portland voters
approval of the historic school bond
measure last year I look forward to
continuing this important work with all
of you thank you all for the work you do
on behalf of our students
Smith we appreciate your message and
your budget and the work you and staff
have put into to create this document as
you pointed out that well it's
relatively stable it sure required a
heck of a lot of pulling from here and
pulling from there because there are
other resources that aren't just from
the state that are disappearing on us so
thank you the board is scheduled to hold
discussions on the proposed budget on
the following dates april twenty second
april' 29th May sixth and May thirteenth
so we encourage you to come and provide
testimony in addition to the public
hearings that I mentioned before at this
time the board acting as budget
committee can discuss the process itself
as outlined but we're not going to
discuss the content of the budget itself
if my fellow board members have any
particular budget questions or areas of
discussion I ask that you please email
or contact or let superintendent Smith
and the co-chairs know if there's
something in specific that you want to
follow up with in those times there are
any comments about our questions about
the process line from when we as a board
will actually be approving the budget
sure I'll give you what I can recall off
the top of my head okay May twenty-fifth
is that things so we will have our
budget hearing on April eighteenth for
public hearing another one on may first
and then the aforementioned meetings
April 22nd 29th May sixth and May
thirteenth and on May twenty-fifth we
were scheduled to
approve or adopt the budget there are
any other questions without any other
questions I'm going to we're going to
end as budget committee and I will
reconvene us as the Board of Education
to consider our beds agenda and now as a
board of education will now consider the
business agenda miss Houston are there
any changes to the board thank you with
no changes do I have a motion and a
second to adopt the business agenda
director Knowles it moves to adopt and
director Regan moves to second seconds
to move the adoption of the business
agenda miss Houston is there any citizen
comin on the business of Jenna there's
not is there any board discussion on the
business agenda no I will note that
there is funding for some Sun schools so
I'm just going to note for potential
conflict of interest for me but with
that being said the board will not vote
on the business agenda all in favor
please indicate by saying yes yes all
opposed please indicate by saying no
business agenda is approved by a vote of
72 0 a student representative garcia
voting yes yes with that we the next
meeting the board of education will be a
public hearing on the proposed budget
this Thursday April eighteenth at six
o'clock wilson high school cafeteria I'm
just reminder to please contact the
world office to sign up in advance if
you'd like to testify and with that this
meeting of the Board of Education is a
Sources
- PPS Board of Education, Archive 2012-2013, https://www.pps.net/Page/2225 (accessed: 2022-03-24T00:57:54.937864Z)
- PPS Communications, "Board of Education" (YouTube playlist), https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PL8CC942A46270A16E (accessed: 2023-10-10T04:10:04.879786Z)
