Despite pleas and rallies from teachers, educators and other staff, 286 employees in the Santa Ana Unified School District are set to be laid off this year.
SAUSD school board trustees approved the layoff plan in a 4-1 vote late Friday night, Jan. 31, with Trustee Brenda Lebsack the lone no vote.
Citing low enrollment and over $180 million spending deficit, school board trustees made the choice to cut down on employees, a decision followed from boos by those who attended the special meeting.
“Unfortunately, we’re facing a very severe budget deficit, and we have to address it,” said Associate Superintendent Ron Hacker. “We have to save money now so we have the ability to provide support to students next year, the year after and the year after that.”
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Santa Ana Unified to decide whether to lay off nearly 300 teachers, other school employees Santa Ana Unified could lay off 350 teachers due to $180 million deficitThe district did not identify Friday which employees will be laid off, but officials said it will be determined based on seniority, meaning staff that has been with the district longer will be less likely to be cut.
Trustees will be presented with a list of names in February, Hacker said. If the board approves it, those employees will receive their pink slips no later than March 15, Hacker said.
The layoff resolution lists 546 positions, but district spokesperson Fermin Leal said that is the number of jobs, not the number of employees, that would be impacted. Cut positions will include teachers, counselors, instructional coaches, curriculum specialists, itinerant teachers, special assignment teachers, social workers, home hospital workers and social workers.
The last time SAUSD faced layoffs was back in 2017. The trustees at the time also cited declining numbers in student enrollment. Hacker said Friday that enrollment has been an issue for SAUSD for about 20 years.
According to Hacker, in the 2018-19 school year, the district had nearly 47,000 students enrolled. During the current school year, enrollment has dropped to just over 36,000.
Santa Ana Educators Association President Sonta Garner-Marcelo said the layoffs nearly eight years ago were just as “unnecessary” as the layoffs the board approved tonight.
“We will keep rallying, keep applying pressure and tell them that this is senseless,” Garner-Marcelo said.
Board President Hector Bustos cast blame on the 2020 school board, arguing that the trustees serving at the time made poor fiscal decisions with COVID-19 relief funds. Bustos, who was elected to the board in 2022, said since previous trustees knew that the funds were temporary, they should have planned better.
SAUSD received $308 million in pandemic relief money from state and federal funding in 2021. At the time, it accounted for 22.5% of the district’s budget.
“We’re at a place where we have to make this decision because we don’t have those COVID-19 one-time funds,” Bustos said. “We don’t have that money anymore to sustain the counselors that we did, and again, it’s because of poor financial planning by the board in 2020.”
Lebsack said she voted against the layoff resolution Friday because she thought educators deserved more transparency. She wanted the board to look into a structured attrition.
Hacker said there was no other way for the district to address the deficit, which he said has been growing for at least the past 10 years, even before the pandemic relief funds.
Hacker said 80% of the district’s budget is made of salaries and benefits.
He previously said layoffs would reduce spending and prevent the district’s financial assets from being handed over to the Orange County Department of Education.
Even though the trustees approved the layoffs, Hacker said it is still possible for some to be rescinded in May after the district holds hearings, where those notified that they will be laid off can contest the decision. The district will also provide support and career resources to the employees handed pink slips.
Teacher Jesenia Gardea, who works with seventh-grade, eighth-grade and high school students, said that the reduction in teachers and staff will lead to more feelings of burnout that educators are already experiencing.
“Teaching takes a lot of planning time, and some of us are already working several hours for free,” Gardea said.
The vote was originally planned for Tuesday night, but after nearly three hours of public comment, the board decided to continue the meeting Friday evening.
The next regular school board meeting is scheduled for Feb. 11 at the district’s W.H. Spurgeon Administration Center at 1601 E. Chestnut Ave., in Santa Ana.
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