A special education class at West Contra Costa Unified’s Stege Elementary School in Richmond.
Credit: Andrew Reed / EdSource
West Contra Costa Unified School District’s school board approved a plan Wednesday night that will cut educator and administrative positions, and reduce funds for programs and supplies in order to stay fiscally solvent and avoid a state takeover.
District officials have been grappling with how to cut $32.7 million in costs between 2024 and 2027; cuts for the current school year total $19.7 million.
Cuts for the rest of the deficit, $13 million, will be spread out over the next two school years: $7 million in 2025-26 and $6 million in 2026-27. District officials warned it’s likely more reductions will occur after 2027.
Board members Leslie Reckler, Cinthia Hernandez and Guadalupe Enllana voted for the plan. Reckler, board president, said she voted for the solvency plan to “literally save the district.”
“No one wants to do this; no one runs for office to do this; no one works here to do this,” Reckler said. “This is an absolute necessity. We are staring down a dire fiscal situation.”
Trustee Demetrio Gonzalez-Hoy was absent while trustee Jamela Smith-Folds abstained from voting.
“I want us to start coming together, and I think the way to say that is to abstain,” Smith-Folds said. “This is part of the board’s job that is the hardest because these numbers (budget cuts) are attached to people.”
According to district officials, declining enrollment, expiration of Covid-19 relief funds, increased costs for special education programs, and underfunded mandates from state and federal governments are reasons West Contra Costa is strapped for cash. Districts across the state have been dealing with the same issues, including San Francisco and Oakland.
It’s not the first time West Contra Costa has faced challenging budget deficits. In 1991, the district became the first in the state to go insolvent and received a $29 million bailout loan, which took 21 years to pay off.
District officials presented a detailed list of staffing cuts — including teachers, social workers, speech therapists, assistant principals, and administrators — spanning from the 2025 school year through 2027. Over the next two school years, about 1.6% of staff in the teachers’ union will be let go for a total savings of about $3.7 million.
Cuts to educator positions are also coming during a time when West Contra Costa schools are struggling to fill vacant positions. Dozens of educators have, at various board meetings, expressed the hardships of not having fully staffed schools. Francisco Ortiz, president of United Teachers of Richmond, said last month that most schools have to use substitutes on a daily basis.
The majority of school budgets are used to pay staff salaries and benefits, district officials said. In West Contra Costa, that amounts to nearly 84%. This is the reason it wasn’t possible to avoid cutting staffing positions, district officials say.
Recent salary increases have also affected spending, district officials said. Salaries have increased 19.5% over the past five years, and benefits have increased by about 26%.
For the next school year, about $100,000 will be cut from the International Baccalaureate (IB) program; the high school theater budget will be reduced by $20,000, and art supplies by $14,000.
District officials said they are exploring other ways to save money that don’t impact the classroom, including increasing annual daily attendance, which is how the district receives revenue. For every 1% increase in attendance, the district would generate $2.75 million in additional state funding.
United Teachers of Richmond gather at West Contra Costa school board meeting Wednesday to protest staff cuts approved a week earlier.
Credit: Monica Velez / EdSource
San Pablo mom Gabriella Garcia said her fourth-grade son sometimes comes home in tears after being bullied about his speech impediment.
Her son receives help through Zoom calls with a speech specialist.
“Unfortunately, I don’t think this virtual format is effective for him,” Garcia said. “He continued to struggle with pronunciation, and it’s been tough for him.”
Garcia pleaded with the West Contra Costa Unified school board on Wednesday night to stop cutting staff, including speech specialists, so her son and others like him can continue getting the hands-on support they need.
Her son’s teacher at Lake Elementary School, Christina Baronian, said she and the other students often have difficulty understanding him and that the only support available is online and through a contractor.
“It’s awful,” Baronian said during public comments. “It’s not giving him the support he needs; he needs an in-person speech therapist. Then I found out (the district) just cut some of the very few in-person (speech therapists) we have. This is his right. This is his future.”
The United Teachers of Richmond also gathered at Wednesday night’s board meeting to protest the $13 million in budget cuts the board approved one week ago, saying the cuts are “unnecessary,” “harmful” and “devastating” to students. The $13 million in cuts will be spread over the next two school years.
“We greatly appreciate the dedicated staff who continually serve our students and community,” interim Superintendent Kim Moses said in a statement to EdSource. “Although reductions are necessary, we are taking great care to address these reductions with minimal impact on staff and students.”
More than 60 West Contra Costa Unified School District (WCCUSD) educators showed up in person and virtually to urge the board to reconsider the fiscal solvency plan it passed. For nearly two hours, almost every speaker asked the board to reconsider the cuts. Union members wore matching red shirts, held up signs, and cheered after every public comment.
Community members at Wednesday’s board meeting chanted “revote” throughout the meeting.
A speech-language pathologist and member of United Teachers of Richmond addresses the West Contra Costa school board during Wednesday’s meeting to protest the staffing cuts the board approved one week prior, which included speech specialists.Credit: Monica Velez / EdSource
“We are urging the board to keep our schools stable,” said United Teachers of Richmond President Francisco Ortiz. “This is going to have a destabilizing effect, and they (the board) have the authority to (avoid cutting staff).”
West Contra Costa Unified School District officials have said that to stay afloat, they need to cut a total of $32.7 million in funds between 2024 and 2027. The bulk of those cuts, $19.7 million, were slashed from the current school year’s budget.
Declining enrollment, expiration of Covid-19 relief funds, increased costs for special education programs, and underfunded mandates from state and federal governments left West Contra Costa strapped for cash, according to district officials. These struggles are being felt across the state, including nearby districts in San Francisco and Oakland which are grappling with budget cuts, school closures and consolidations.
Meanwhile, the California Teachers Association last week launched a statewide campaign called We Can’t Wait, uniting teachers in 32 school districts to leverage their administrations for higher pay and benefits, smaller class sizes, and mental health support. As part of the campaign, more than 100 San Francisco, Oakland, Berkeley and Richmond educators rallied in a downpour in front of Oakland City Hall.
Will the board revote?
No board member has indicated any plan to call for another vote on the budget.
Board members Leslie Reckler, Cinthia Hernandez, and Guadalupe Enllana voted for the plan. Jamela Smith-Folds abstained, and Demetrio Gonzalez-Hoy was absent.
“These reductions are not secret,” board President Reckler wrote in an email to EdSource. “They are part of a years-long public fiscal solvency plan that was approved by the Contra Costa County Office of Education. Further, Labor has worked alongside board members and staff to identify reductions. These reductions are necessary to align adults to declining student counts.”
West Contra Costa has faced challenging budget deficits before. In 1991, the district became the first in the state to go insolvent and received a $29 million bailout loan, which took 21 years to pay off.
Board member Gonzalez-Hoy said in a statement that the district needs to stop concentrating on what to cut and begin focusing on where it needs to invest and how to bring in more revenue. He added that resources should be put into increasing enrollment, daily attendance and growing programs. He said he will ask the board president to form a task force to address these issues.
“We as a whole spend more time getting rid of what is broken instead of trying to fix it,” Gonzalez-Hoy said. “If we just keep concentrating on cuts and reduction, eventually we will disappear. We are deeply divided as a community, and it is time for us to come together for the future of our students.”
West Contra Costa is not currently considering school closures or consolidations, trustee Hernandez said in an emailed statement.
“As a board member, I deeply understand the profound impact these financial challenges have on our school community and the urgent need for essential services that may no longer be available,” Hernandez said. “These are difficult choices, and none were made lightly. However, our priority remains securing a fiscally responsible path forward that allows us to continue serving our students effectively.”
Vacanciesand staffing cuts
Emilia Calderón teaches math at Richmond High School, and she said she constantly has to sub for other classes during her free period because of the high number of vacancies.
“Every year they cut teachers, and even though we are lacking teachers, they (the district) still cut teachers,” she said. “And so I’m subbing for classes with vacant positions, and then it feels ridiculous to have them turn around and say, ‘We’re going to cut more teachers.’ How does that make sense?”
Over the next two school years, about 1.6% of the United Teachers of Richmond staff will be let go for a total savings of about $3.7 million, including teachers, social workers, speech therapists and assistant principals.
But with looming cuts, students and staff have also felt the weight of having longtime vacancies. How do these exist at the same time? It’s a question the teachers union and community has been grappling with, Ortiz said.
Francisco Ortiz, United Teachers of Richmond president, addresses the West Contra Costa school board on Wednesday during public comment to protest the staffing cuts the board approved one week prior.Credit: Monica Velez / EdSource
West Contra Costa’s fiscal solvency plan uses multiyear projections based on fully-staffed schools, Ortiz said, which is about 1,600 educators. Currently, there are about 130 vacant positions, which is equivalent to nearly $19 million, he said.
“It creates this crisis that we have to reduce but we don’t have fully staffed people,” Ortiz said. “If we had a fully staffed school district, then that could potentially make sense, but we don’t have a fully staffed school district.”
But Moses said that when there are vacant positions, the district still needs to pay for substitutes, overtime or contractors to cover services.
“These replacement costs offset the salaries that have been set aside for the vacant positions,” Moses said. “Due to current vacancy levels, we expect that there will be a certificated job available for all current WCCUSD educators for the 2025-26 school year.”
The deadline for the district to send layoff notices is March 15.
“A lot of the folks we have in our district, they’re either homegrown or they choose to come here,” Ortiz said, referring to district educators. “We want to provide them with an incentive to stay in our district, and we’re currently not doing that with these haphazard or ill-conceived moves.”
But in the meantime, the educators who are choosing to stay in West Contra Costa are trying to help students in ways they weren’t trained to.
“We not only provide curriculum and teaching, but we’re literally like their parents sometimes and emotional support,” Calderón said. “Since they’re cutting all these social workers, guess who gets the brunt of that emotional support? I try my best, but I’m not a therapist, and it’s quite honestly dangerous to try and have a math teacher be a kid’s therapist.”
