'Something doesn't add up.' Sudden deficit slashes Mt. Healthy teachers, audit underway

A sudden multimillion-dollar deficit forced Mount Healthy City School District to cut nearly one-third of its teaching staff for next school year. But while dozens of teachers cope with the loss of jobs they love and begin to search for new ones at nearby schools, district leaders have yet to divulge exactly how Mount Healthy landed in this devastating situation.

"None of us know what's going on," Denise Dean-Evans said at a Thursday school board meeting. She said she's been teaching for nearly five decades and has worked in four school districts. "I have never seen this many people cut. Ever."

Audits are being conducted, Superintendent Valerie Hawkins assured. But aside from generic budget scapegoats − the end of COVID-19 relief dollars, dwindling enrollment, state funding changes, inflation and "unforeseen expenses" such as facility repairs − the treasurer hasn't said why the district's budget, which was balanced in August, plummeted to a $5 million deficit by November. And the most recent forecast shows the district has fallen even further from financial stability.

Mount Healthy City Schools: District to layoff 80 employees, including 67 teachers

"We're still figuring some of this out ourselves," Julie Turner, president of the Mount Healthy School Board, said Thursday.

Treasurer Kimberly Hughes did not answer questions from The Enquirer after she was given a week to respond. She's also not answered questions from her colleagues about the jump from no deficit to now a $7.5 million deficit.

“She has not been able to give us a solid explanation," Hawkins said Friday.

At the meeting, while teachers sat front and center in Mount Healthy High School's auditorium holding hands, the board approved a resolution to terminate 80 contracts: four staff members, nine administrators and 67 teachers.

Who was laid off from Mount Healthy City Schools?

Some educators in the audience shouted for Hawkins to read aloud the names of those being cut. School leaders refused in the name of privacy for those on the list, despite it being public record and already circulated in the community.

"You owe us that," someone from the crowd yelled to the school board.

Turner said anyone present who wanted to read their own name could step to the podium and do so. Two teachers did: Jeanette Denlinger and Matt Glazier. Denlinger, a fourth grade teacher at Mount Healthy South Elementary School, returned to her seat audibly crying and hugging her coworkers.

Specifically who gets cut is out of the district's hands and based on seniority, Chuck Ogdan, the district's assistant superintendent for human resources, told The Enquirer. So the bulk of the cuts went to "very, very good young teachers" who will finish out the end of this school year and receive health benefits through the summer.

The district was planning to cut 28 teaching positions for next year regardless of a deficit, Ogdan said, because Mount Healthy hired about two dozen teachers with Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Programs (ESSER) dollars. That decision was made to reduce elementary class sizes and focus on recovering from pandemic learning loss. But pandemic relief dollars end in the fall.

In the meantime, Ogdan said, "we are burning the midnight oil to find them a job."

"The profession needs them," he said.

Cincinnati Public Schools hosted an open house hiring event for educators impacted by the Mount Healthy layoffs earlier in March.

Timeline of Mount Healthy's financial woes

School districts must submit five-year financial forecasts to the state twice a year. According to Ohio law, the state can place school systems with troubling forecasts on fiscal caution, fiscal watch and fiscal emergency depending on several factors.

Districts in fiscal emergency have a substantial deficit or did not provide a satisfactory recovery plan after being in fiscal caution or fiscal watch. They give up the right to determine cuts themselves, and instead a state-selected team takes over district finances and even has the authority to remove the superintendent or treasurer.

This system has been in place for nearly three decades, and 42 districts have entered fiscal emergency in that time. There were no Ohio schools in fiscal emergency as of March 20, when the state released its annual report. But Mount Healthy City School District asked in February to be put on that list.

Here's a timeline of the district's financial woes since June, some of which was outlined in a recent newsletter from the district.

June: The state moves Mount Healthy to fiscal caution after it becomes clear it will have a $700,000 deficit in three years.

Summer months: Administrators work with the state on a plan to reduce spending, which includes not replacing several positions where faculty resigned or retired.

August: Mount Healthy is no longer in fiscal caution.

November: Treasurer Hughes presents a new five-year forecast that shows deficit spending on the horizon and the district again enters fiscal caution status. The deficit for fiscal year 2024 is about $5 million.

“That was the first time any of us were aware of that," Hawkins told The Enquirer.

Winter months: The district works with the state on a new plan to remove its deficit spending, to no avail. An outside auditor redoes the district's budget and finds there is actually a $7.5 million deficit in fiscal year 2024.

“We have looked at a variety of scenarios to reduce spending during the 23/24 school year; however, we could not recover enough funds to cover the deficit,” the newsletter reads.

Feb. 12: The school board approves a resolution authorizing district leaders to inform the state that the district cannot formulate an acceptable financial recovery plan. The district requests the state move Mount Healthy to fiscal emergency.

The state moves the district to fiscal watch instead.

Feb. 28: The school board approves a five-year financial forecast that shows a $7.5 million deficit for this fiscal year and indicates the district will run out of cash in April, district documents say. The board again requests the state immediately place Mount Healthy into fiscal emergency.

March 21: The school board approves 80 layoffs.

The state is working with Mount Healthy to audit their financial forecast, Hawkins said. The district remains in fiscal watch but will likely move to fiscal emergency in the coming weeks.

Are other cuts on the horizon for Mount Healthy Schools? What about a levy?

Ogdan said the teachers hired with pandemic relief dollars allowed the district to reduce class sizes so that some elementary classrooms had student-teacher ratios as low as 9-to-1.

Next fall the district is sticking to the state minimum, which is 25-to-1.

At a recent community discussion on finances, administrators clarified that the district's financial struggles will not impact free meal services for students. All kids in the district will continue to receive free breakfasts and lunches, which are federally funded.

Community members also had questions about transportation. The district reinstated busing for high schoolers in 2021 and said there's no intention to take that service away.

"While removing busing may offer short-term financial relief, it could potentially have negative effects on student attendance and achievement," the district wrote in a Q&A presentation that's posted on the website.

If the district does move to fiscal emergency and the state takes over its finances, district leaders would not have control of these decisions.

Hawkins told The Enquirer that Mount Healthy hasn't passed an operating levy since 2003. But in recent focus groups with the community, it became clear there was no chance voters would support a levy. Property taxes have increased too much, she said.

The board is not currently considering a levy on 2024 ballots.

The district hosted a community financial meeting in February and will do so again on Wednesday at 6 p.m. at the Jr/Sr High School at 8101 Hamilton Ave.

'The district has failed us,' teachers union head says

Julie Wakefield, Mount Healthy's teachers union president, addressed the board at Thursday's meeting.

"The district has failed us," she said. Teachers in the audience cheered.

"Teaching in Mount Healthy is a passion. It is a calling. It is hard," Wakefield said. "Even the good days are hard, but we love it. We choose to be here. We choose to put in the countless hours beyond contract time to prepare for our students. We choose Mount Healthy next year even though our jobs will be so much harder, because you have failed us."

The school board voted Thursday to offer open enrollment next school year with the hope of bringing in more revenue for the district. And Turner repeatedly acknowledged how difficult this time is for everyone involved, including for board members who have to make difficult decisions.

But Turner's words of compassion did nothing to soothe the hurt some educators are feeling. Marla Waldron, an intervention specialist, said the educators who are staying next year are scared for the district's future.

"Something doesn't add up," she said. "How does this happen? We trust our school board to manage the financial part of the district. And so, we feel like we're on a sinking ship."

Judi Nortman, who grew up in the community and now teaches fourth graders in the district, said four of the six people on her team are being cut.

The school board needs to stop approving every proposal from the administration, she said, and start asking questions. What can Mount Healthy actually afford?

"You are letting people go who cared about this district," Nortman said. "You have to stop saying yes and you need to start asking questions because it is hurting your people and it is hurting our kids."

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: Mount Healthy budget cuts: How did we get here?