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Layoffs appear inevitable at
The District 208 school board will meet in closed session this evening as they begin a series of meetings this month to come up with budget cuts as the board struggles to reduce a projected operating deficit of more than $2 million for the 2010-11 school year.
Because no full-time RB teachers are retiring this year, layoffs may be the only way to make a significant cut in that deficit. The school is required to give tenured teachers 60 days notice of impending layoffs and non-tenured teachers 45 days notice.
“We will not be able to sustain for next year the same staff that we have this year and be able to reduce the expenditure side of out budget,” said District 208 Interim Superintendent David Bonnette on Thursday.
The purpose of tonight’s closed-door school board meeting is to have the board consider possible cuts and layoffs.
“I’ve got some personnel things for them to consider,” Bonnette said.
Bonnette will make a public presentation outlining possible cuts at the school board’s regularly scheduled meeting on Tuesday, March 9.
The board will likely make final decisions on layoffs at a special meeting tentatively scheduled for March 23, Bonnette said.
“We’re going to have a special meeting on the twenty-third of March, and if there are any RIFs [reductions in force] or layoffs or that type of thing, in all likelihood they will be acted on that meeting,” Bonnette said.