The Long Beach Unified School District is looking for a new operator to handle a major after-school program following the city of Long Beach\u2019s decision not to participate in an attempt to save money.<\/p>\n
Since 2002, the city\u2019s Parks Department has helped anchor the initiative, known to families as WRAP. It provides free programming for hundreds of transitional-kindergarten through eighth-grade students across seven local campuses: Garfield, Edison, King, Grant, Lafayette, Burbank and Herrera.<\/p>\n
Long Beach Unified officials stress that the vital student services will continue under a new operator this fall. It\u2019s not clear yet who it will be and what, if any, changes they\u2019ll make.<\/p>\n
The city\u2019s quiet retreat from the program has sparked deep anxiety among three full-time and 80 part-time municipal workers who now face potential layoffs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Workers say they were first notified of the decision during a June 15 staff meeting with a city superintendent, where they were told their employment with the program would conclude on Aug. 15.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cEverybody was kind of caught off guard,\u201d said one 13-year city employee based at an elementary school, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to protect her position. \u201cI mean, again, I\u2019ve been doing this for 13 years; we had people there that had been doing it over 20 years that had never moved sites.\u201d<\/p>\n
Today, the before- and after-school services are paid for primarily through the state-funded Expanded Learning Opportunities Program (ELOP), a combination of California\u2019s After School Education and Safety (ASES) grant and specific ELOP apportionments.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Historically, the city was granted this funding by the school district without a formal bidding process, typically receiving roughly $15 per student plus administrative fees, which it supplemented with allocations from its own general fund.\u00a0<\/p>\n
This year, however, the school district was forced to overhaul its grant-funding process and consider bids to meet tightening state mandates for the program\u2019s ELOP funding.<\/p>\n
Shortly after, the city informed the school district it would not bid on the program.\u00a0<\/p>\n
City spokesperson Jennifer De Prez said the decision \u201cwas made so that the department can focus its limited financial resources\u201d on other programs it runs.\u00a0<\/p>\n