200 unarmed security positions<\/a>, mostly through attrition, bringing the total job cuts to above 1,000, according to a district report prepared for the workshop.<\/p>\nSchool district officials have said in past meetings that 1,000 job cuts would equal about $75 million. But Hepburn\u2019s plan includes 344 jobs that were on the books but weren\u2019t even funded this year. The total savings of his plan is estimated to be about $40 million.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt should be no surprise that the 2026 School Board gave clear direction to the Superintendent to reduce the number of administrative and central office positions,\u201d Zeman told the Sun Sentinel. \u201cThese reductions are necessary after 25 years of kicking this can down the road. And the unfortunate cost of kicking this can down the road within fixed budgets is that we\u2019ve not been able to adequately fund our teachers and other school-based educators.\u201d<\/p>\n
Zeman said that \u201canything less than 1,000 cuts to funded positions may appear to the board to be kicking the can.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hixon said she didn\u2019t have a concern about using unfilled positions toward the 1,000 jobs. She said Hepburn had made clear he planned to do that. But Hixon said she was disappointed that the plan doesn\u2019t eliminate many high-paid positions.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m sure it\u2019s very hard as a chief to try to eliminate anything, and you think everything is important,\u201d Hixon said. \u201cI think there will be some changes to what is presented right now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lozano, the chief human resources officer, discussed the proposal at a Thursday night meeting of North Area Advisory, a north Broward parent group. He said the plan does cut many upper administrator jobs, including directors and executive directors.<\/p>\n
An analysis prepared by the district states that 16% of upper-level jobs were cut, compared to 13% of lower-level jobs.<\/p>\n
\u201cDr. Hepburn directed to us\u201d to make the largest cuts at the top, Lozano told attendees.<\/p>\n
But while 40 filled and 22 unfilled district-level administrative jobs are recommended to be cut, Hepburn\u2019s organization chart also shows that nine new positions are proposed to be added. In some cases, employees may not be laid off but will instead be demoted to a lower-level position, Lozano told the Sun Sentinel at Thursday\u2019s meeting.<\/p>\n
For example, the plan proposes to eliminate the executive director of professional practices and labor relations, a job that oversees employee investigations as well as negotiations with employee groups. But the proposal also adds a new director of labor relations position.<\/p>\n
![\"Ernie](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Ernie-Lozano.jpg\")
Ernie Lozano, chief human resources officer for Broward Schools, answers questions Thursday at a meeting of the district’s North Area Advisory Committee. (Sun Sentinel \/ Scott Travis)<\/p>\n
\u201cI eliminated the executive director position to save the district some money and then created the director of labor relations, because we still do a lot of work with our collective bargaining groups and need someone at the level to be able to effectively negotiate with our district people,\u201d Lozano said. \u201cSo now that position can focus more on labor relations, and professional practices can focus on professional practices, whereas that one individual was carrying both.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cervera said it wasn\u2019t the board\u2019s intent to create new jobs.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe thought that the positions were going to be eliminated, not rebranded under a different category and given a clever new name,\u201d he said. \u201cAt the end of the day, the goal of this is to save us money.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lozano said the majority of positions are being eliminated, without new ones being created.<\/p>\n
At Thursday\u2019s North Advisory meeting, several attendees voiced concern about how the cuts were made.<\/p>\n
Cynthia Dominique, who chairs the countywide District Advisory Council, said the organization chart includes executive directors, directors and managers who only oversee a small number of people.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhy so many levels of bureaucracy?\u201d she asked. \u201cThere are significantly more cuts that you all can make.\u201d<\/p>\n
Some questioned why the plan included cutting 119 teachers, counselors, social workers and exceptional student educational specialists who aren\u2019t assigned to a specific school.<\/p>\n
Lozano said that he expects most will get placed in new jobs by June 30, but Broward Teachers Union President Anna Fusco said at the meeting that employees were told on Wednesday that they are losing their jobs.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese are the teachers who get farmed out to schools, to teach in small groups, to work with the most vulnerable,\u201d she said. \u201cWhen a teacher gets an illness and is out for three months, they go and cover a class.\u201d<\/p>\n
She said district administrators led School Board members \u201cto believe we\u2019re cutting district people that don\u2019t touch students.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cervera said he\u2019s angry that the plan includes teachers.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe should not, cannot and must not cut and eliminate teachers. Period, Full stop,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd apparently, that\u2019s what happened here.\u201d<\/p>\n
On Friday, the Broward Teachers Union filed a grievance, alleging Hepburn failed to provide a required 10-day notice to the union about \u201cthe reasons for layoffs, number of positions to be affected, and the names of employees to be laid off by site.\u201d<\/p>\n
As for the remedy sought, the grievance states, \u201cDr. Hepburn will immediately cease the layoff implementation until the proper notification is given, and any other remedy deemed appropriate by an arbitrator should this grievance proceed to arbitration.\u201d<\/p>\n
The district disputes the union\u2019s claims.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe District adhered to all collective bargaining and employment agreements in notifying unions regarding impacted employees,\u201d district spokesman John Sullivan told the Sun Sentinel.<\/p>\n
Board member Holness didn\u2019t say what specific job cuts he would approve, but he said they are necessary due to \u201clongstanding misalignment in staffing levels\u201d as well as\u00a0declining student enrollment.<\/p>\n
\u201cWithout decisive steps, we risk facing significant financial instability. While these decisions may be difficult, I am confident that, as a Board and as a district, we must take the necessary actions to place the district on a more stable financial path,\u201d Holness told the Sun Sentinel. \u201cAt this stage, no action is not an option, as the short- and long-term consequences for inaction are too grave.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A proposal to eliminate about 350 filled jobs is drawing scrutiny from some Broward County School Board members…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":162673,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[113,249,251,250,266,115,109,32797],"class_list":["post-236928","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-education","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-social","tag-south-florida-schools"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236928","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=236928"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/236928\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/162673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=236928"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=236928"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=236928"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}