South Huntington Plans Staff, Sports Cuts

Last-minute pleas to save favorite programs, grim news about job and program cuts and a pitch for givebacks by teachers were highlights of a marathon South Huntington school board meeting Wednesday night.

The newest draft of the budget calls for a 6.93 percent tax increase based on a small increase of the budget to $140,342,786. The budget, if passed as set out Wednesday night, would mean an annual increase of $508.45 for a home assessed at $3,500.

Among the proposed cuts: Several teachers, custodians and paraprofessionals and middle-school sports, the popular ninth period at Walt Whitman High School and myriad other programs could be gone when the South Huntington school board adopts its final budget on April 13. That will followed by a public hearing May 10 and a vote by the public on May 17.

The cuts as outlined by this draft budget include: The elimination of 21 sports teams at the middle school level, which would save $191,000; three Whitman sports teams, bowling, golf and swimming, will also be cut, saving, respectively, $14,178, $19,578 and $5,341.

Staff cuts of 18.2 teaching positions, 4 administrative staff, 30 paraprofessional staff, 8 custodial/maintenance staff and 2.5 clerical staff. Extracurricular reductions, saving $16,706 at Stimson and $66,186 at Whitman. Less busing, for before and after school service, and summer school.

The board said that it had reached an agreement with the South Huntington Administrators Association to accept a two-year zero increase contract.

That information was brought up by several people in the audience as the issue of the teachers contract and possible givebacks came up, sometimes in testy exchanges with or about teachers union president Dennis Callahan. Speaking to the board and occasionally to other speakers who referred to him, Callahan said that he was meeting with his membership Thursday to discuss the board’s newest budget proposal and the impact on his members. Wednesday’s meeting at Stimson school was similar to others in the series of budget discussions, with students, parents, teachers and other residents going to the microphone to express their views in support of programs or ideas important to them.

Getting particular attention was an insistent effort by parents of the "Challenge and Beyond" programs, which serve gifted and talented children in primary grades, to retain the program in its current form. Board members were on the receiving end of an email campaign in recent weeks to try to save the program in its current form and speakers presented a petition by parents hoping to keep the program intact.

So, too, several students and parents pleaded for the retention of the ninth period, citing because it allows students to have more choices in electives and take more AP and other advanced classes. While board members previously had expressed support for the extra session, the discussion at Wednesday’s meeting made clear that cutting it would mean a cost savings of $1.2 million. A large chunk of that savings would come from eliminating teachers.

                                                 Reductions Taken