The newly elected trustee of the five-person board representing
the Hollister School District knows the decisions he makes affect
hundreds of kids and programs that have been in place for
years.
Joe Navarro knows he is in a tough spot.
The newly elected trustee of the five-person board representing the Hollister School District knows the decisions he makes affect hundreds of kids and programs that have been in place for years.
But he also knows, at this time, there is nothing he can do but to cut programs and jobs, and hope the state begins to help the district clear its budgetary issues.
Just two months ago, during Navarro’s first meeting with the board, the district was one day away from a possible state takeover. After he and two other newly elected board members, were sworn in, they immediately had to hear testimonies on nearly $5.5 million in cuts. And eventually all those cuts were made.
Included were the elimination of the schools’ elementary music program, the middle school sports program and libraries. The decision was a difficult one, but Navarro and the board had no choice.
“We had to do it,” he said.
They expect more cuts in the future, as Gov. Jerry Brown finalizes his budget looking for programs to eliminate or reduce.
But looking ahead, the board is a little more optimistic of its future.
“We need to look at the good side of things,” Navarro said. “We need to be optimistic.”
With that belief, the board is being “proactive” in trying to reestablish programs for the future, while keeping a good sense of the budget. Among the slate of to-dos, the board intends to create a nonprofit fund, promote fundraising efforts from grassroots organizations and possibly invest in a parcel tax.
Front and center of that initiative is Navarro and the newly elected board president Michal Query.
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Both are former teachers who hoped to revitalize the classroom rhetoric and introduce new materials and ideas, but with the tightened budget they had to rethink their plan, Query said.
“We are struggling, but we will pull through this,” she said.
The first step is already in progress. The struggling school district is working with the Foundation for San Benito County to help create a nonprofit fund. The board expects to get the nonprofit organization approved by the end of the year.
The board is still working on the mission statement, but expects to apply for nonprofit status in the upcoming months.
“Hopefully, we will be able to restore programs we were forced to eliminate,” Query said.
At the top of the list is funneling money back to the district’s libraries – because for Query and Navarro the library is a program of utmost importance, they said.
“We want to keep the libraries open,” Navarro said. “When my daughter heard we were cutting the libraries, she said ‘How could you do that?’ It broke my heart.”
Query added that when she walked on the Ladd Lane Elementary campus, the location of her most recent teaching job, students wanted to know why the library was closing.
“It’s hard to tell them why,” she said.
But the efforts to keep the libraries open are praised by the Hollister Elementary School Teachers Association.
HESTA President Joe Rivas said the teachers are happy with the board’s push to save some of the programs.
“All of the teachers are grateful for the effort because they are trying to save these things,” he said.
To continue the budget cutting ways, Rivas hopes the board looks at the district office next to cut the large number of staff members or the superintendent’s salary, he said.
“It seems crazy to me that they are so willing to cut all of these things but they do very little cutting in the district office,” he said.
Like the board members, Rivas hoped that new money coming in, regardless of where it came from, should be given to the libraries.
“How is one library going to serve all of the students?” he said. “We need the libraries.”
Due to budget cuts, at the end of February the Hollister School District will have only one employed librarian.
Additional efforts from the board include a budget advisory committee and a program restoration and development committee. The board will also work closely with the “Mr. Ostenson’s Save The Music Drive” in their efforts to save the district’s music program.
Each month at a different district school, two board members will hold a public meeting to answer all questions.
“We want to solve a lot of these problems,” Navarro said. “Hopefully, our legacy will be that we worked hard to work under the budget we had.”
