Teachers: Failed State Budget Talks Doom Public Education

California state budget talks between Gov. Jerry Brown and the Legislature have stalled and now teachers are paying the price.

School districts were counting on a June special election to save a mass rash of layoffs.

The Desert Sands Unified School District is facing a $9 million budget shortfall for the next fiscal year.

Class sizes will expand, and the school year will shrink.

Teachers were banking on an extension of tax increases to save their jobs.

But that hope all but disappeared Tuesday when the governor announced he was ending budget talks with Republican lawmakers.

“My heart sank,” said Tom Burbank, president of the Desert Sands Teachers Association.

“Teachers are under attack,” said Bev Bricker, president of the Palm Springs Teachers Association.

“I think education should come first,” said Vicente Meno, a concerned parent.

The DSUSD has already reduced its spending per student more than $1,800 in the past four years.

The district is now looking at a further reduction of $350.

The Coachella Valley Unified School District is facing a range between $19 and $634 in cuts per student, and if that’s not bad enough, 157 district teachers councilors and administrators have been issued layoff notices.

Almost 90 Palm Springs Unified School District certificated employees have also been notified of a potential layoff.

Desert Sands Unified stands to lose 85 positions.

“Rather than being praised and rewarded for the gains we make, we’re punished and criticized and we’re all tired of it,” said Burbank.

Bricker says teachers are now counting on a public-backed initiative to extend taxes to make the ballot in November.

But by that time, it will still be too late for the teachers that have already received notices.

“This is not a game,” said Bricker. “Our student’s lives are at stake. My teacher’s livelihood is at stake.”

Meno has three boys attending class in Coachella Valley Unified.

He’s tired of the back and forth in Sacramento.

“It’s all blah, blah, blah, and they’re just going around the actual problem,” said Meno, who believes continuing to strip money from schools and students is, “like taking food off their plates for the future.”

School district boards have to decide by mid-May whether or not to make the issued layoff notices official, and as of now, it looks like most if not all of those notified will not return next year.

“They are working to support California’s future and they’re now pawns in a political scheme,” said Bricker.