The Abridged version:
- For months, leaders from the Sacramento City Unified School District have sparred with their financial overseers, representatives from the Sacramento County Office of Education.
- School district officials contend they have made substantial headway tackling a more than $150 million deficit. County leaders continue to question the validity of the claimed progress.
- The local conflict roped in the state’s top education official, who is poised to intervene if the back-and-forth continues.
Leaders from the Sacramento City Unified School District continue to spar with their financial overseers, with only limited options for resolution apparent.
The roundabout conflict between district officials and representatives from the Sacramento County Office of Education has spanned months, coming after a breakthrough agreement with the district teachers union in July, which county advisers pulled the plug on.
Since then, district leaders say they have made significant headway, with a plan to climb out of a more than $150 million deficit and avoid a state loan.
County officials continue to voice doubts about the claimed progress.
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As the two agencies trade barbed letters, the conflict has caught the attention of state Superintendent Tony Thurmond, who has threatened to intervene if the county does not acquiesce.
“We are more than happy for it to be over,” said Taylor Kayatta, a Sacramento City Unified trustee.
Thurmond involvement on the table
The July deal’s chief provision allowed the district to temporarily pay for retired teachers’ health benefits with a special reserve. Doing so would save roughly $97 million from the general fund, contract documents estimated.
County adviser Luz Cázares blocked the agreement, citing concerns about using a reserve for ongoing costs and that the contract would close bargaining for another four years.
District leaders pushed back, saying their use of a rainy-day fund would be legitimate and that even with a technically closed contract, they could still negotiate with the union. Officials took their protests to Thurmond and the state Department of Education.
Thurmond, while not officially overturning Cázares’ decision, backed the district’s logic. He warned county officials he would be watching closely, ready to potentially take over as the district’s fiscal adviser, a power granted to the state superintendent in California education law.
“He reserves the right to get involved. So, that’s open,” Kayatta said. “It’s up to him, I guess, if he thinks the county is not meeting us halfway.”
One piece moves forward
With Thurmond’s public support behind the district, Superintendent Cancy McArn in a Sept. 9 email asked county leaders to restore the July agreement.
Cázares responded weeks later to say she would consider it — if the district could demonstrate certain budget solutions and project a positive cash balance this and next year.
As of Thursday, county and district officials still appear unable to agree on whether those conditions have been met.
Cázares said she had “grave concerns” about the district’s most recent budget plan, in a letter dated Sept. 23.
McArn said those worries are “unfounded,” in her response Thursday.
“Your observations, questions, and reminders appear to be a further effort to delay any actual reconsideration of your rescission,” McArn wrote.
Cázares had conceded on at least one front.
Trustees and union members in early September advanced a second agreement, adding a fourth year of dipping into the reserve fund and approving alternative health plan options. The county adviser put the deal on ice, saying she had not had adequate time to review it yet.
On Thursday, the district’s chief business officer, Gerardo Castillo, said the county office OK’d that second deal this week.
“I appreciate the approval,” said Trustee Jasjit Singh. “This is just part of that puzzle and part of that process.”
“There’s an opportunity here for us to really get to where we need to get to,” he added. “And we can move past this back and forth.”
