initially planned<\/a> to hold a non-voting workshop on Monday, with a final vote next week. But the board agreed last week to make Monday\u2019s meeting one where a final vote could be held. Superintendent Howard Hepburn urged the board not to delay.<\/p>\n\u201cWe need to make a final decision, so we can move forward, contact any newly impacted employees and start revving up the system to support our impacted employees,\u201d Hepburn told the board.<\/p>\n
He said most affected employees would be eligible for jobs at schools, such as teaching positions, where the district has frequent vacancies due to turnover.<\/p>\n
Some board members were eager to accept the majority of cuts and changes to the organization chart and urged the board to pass it. Board member Lori Alhadeff said failing to make cuts could prompt a state takeover, since the district\u2019s reserves have been teetering near a state-required minimum.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe can make this decision now, acting with care for the people affected,\u201d she said. \u201cOr we can delay and make a worse version of this decision later under more pressure. I choose now, and I support this plan, not because it is easy, but because our students deserve a district structure to serve them for the long term.\u201d<\/p>\n
But other board members made numerous motions, seeking to cut or reinstate certain jobs.<\/p>\n
Hepburn said the largest percentage of job cuts were at the director level or above, but Board member Adam Cervera still argued the organization chart cut too much from positions that deal directly with students and too little from senior leadership.<\/p>\n
He posted a sign next to him on the dais, proclaiming, \u201cSave Broward Schools. Vote Down the Org Chart.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWas our goal to protect the bigwigs in this building while screwing over the teachers and school-based staff? I\u2019m not OK with that. But if that was the goal, we nailed it,\u201d he said. \u201cBut for the record, that was never my intention and was never my goal.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cervera made a series of motions to eliminate about a half-dozen executive director positions, in areas such as food and nutrition, information technology, transportation and maintenance, none of which passed. The board did agree to cut a vacant director of transportation position that Hepburn hadn\u2019t recommended but said he could live without.<\/p>\n
Most board members weren\u2019t willing to accept a proposal from Cervera to cut an executive director in the IT department.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is a huge organization that requires technical support. Any type of virus or any attack could just take down our entire school system,\u201d Board member Maura Bulman said. \u201cI think we have to be very careful, and I don\u2019t want to be pennywise, pound-foolish about how we\u2019re looking at these positions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Board member Allen Zeman, who voiced concerns last month that the organization chart didn\u2019t make enough cuts, told the board Monday the board will have more opportunities to look for cost savings, and he\u2019s largely satisfied with the organization chart.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese cuts are the beginning, not the end,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Broward School Board members on Monday inched toward approving a plan that would cut hundreds jobs, following more…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":267179,"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-267178","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\/267178","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=267178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/267178\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/267179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=267178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=267178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=267178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}