Massapequa school officials have outlined more details about budget cuts and staff reductions, but it will be another week until we know the exact number of layoffs.
Superintendent Charles Sulc and Deputy Superintendent Alan Adcock gave the district's second budget presentation to the Board of Education last week and once again blamed the new state tax cap for the district's budget woes.
Sulc again said there were no plans to cut programs for the 2012-13 school year.
But he would not guarantee that programs would remain intact after that given the current economic climate.
"The question you have to ask yourself is...'How in the world do we keep it going under what we have right now in New York State?'" Sulc said.
The Superintendent said that in order to keep under the tax cap the district would have to reduce positions across the board including Administrative, Teaching, Teacher Assistants, and Monitor jobs.
The district already announced the elimination of two cleaning positions by attrition and the layoff of one bus driver.
But they had not yet publicly announced the other layoffs, because the were still working out details including retirement incentives to ease the pain.
"We can't do that tonight," Sulc told those in attendance Thursday at Massapequa High School, explaining that the retirement incentive closed just prior to the meeting. "In addition a lot of communication has to take place between various employee groups and the employees themselves.
Sulc said the district will announce the number of jobs at the next meeting on March 15.
After the meeting, Sulc explained some of the issues that still need to be worked out.
"There are regulations associated with it, and seniority is a major factor," he said. Sulc said that teachers who are certified in more than one subject could be eligible to be excessed in one area and needed in another. For example, a teacher certified in biology and physics might lose his job as a biology teacher, but stay on as a physics teacher.
"We've been at this process for the better part of six weeks, it's going to continue for another couple of weeks to make sure we do it right," he said." continue
