News
Budget Update: Hiring, spending freeze implemented
Superintendent Maria L. Goodloe-Johnson and School Board members are working with staff, families and community members to ensure that students remain the top priority as Seattle Public Schools faces an estimated $37.5 million budget gap for the 2011-12 school year. Don Kennedy, Chief Financial and Operations Officer, announced in a Dec. 8, 2010, e-mail to all staff that the District was placing a hiring and spending freeze effective immediately. As in the previous two years, the budget gap is a result of continued state funding reductions, discontinued federal stimulus funds and increasing costs.
Kennedy attached a bulletin to the e-mail and said the freeze is similar to District action taken last year to effectively deal with the budget problems. He said compliance with the requirements of the bulletin is critical to helping ensure that the District's budget difficulties are dealt with and that staff adhere to the State Audit recommendations requiring employees to comply with District policies and procedures.
The hiring freeze affects all non-grant and non-capital District positions to outside applicants. Exceptions to the hiring freeze include positions required by contract, positions associated with safety concerns, and positions where an "extreme need" exists.
The spending freeze applies to discretionary expenditures in non-grant Central Support Department and Program budgets. the spending freeze does not apply to schools, grants, school ASB funds, trust funds and capital project funds.
"I realize that freezing hiring and spending can place a burden on our efforts to accomplish the work we have been tasked to perform. However, the dollars that we save this year will go towards protecting jobs for next year, " Kennedy said. "For instance, the similar measure we undertook last year resulted in $5 million in savings, which were used to offset the budget gap. Had we not realized this $5 million of savings, we would have had to lay off approximately 65 more people in order to balance the budget. I ask for your support in implementing these measures as we work towards finding solutions to our budget problems."