Local News
(2009-10-09)
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GRAND RAPIDS, MI
(Michigan Radio) -
The state's new K-12 education budget could force school districts to lay off teachers in the middle of the year.
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It's a problem that comes up every year. School districts, by law, are required to set their budgets in July. But the state's budget process drags on until the end of September - this year it's dragged on longer.
So, students are a quarter of the way through the year, and now districts have been handed a $165 per-pupil cut in state funding.
John Helmholdt is a spokesman for Grand Rapids Public Schools. He says mid-year teacher layoffs are a possibility.
"That's disruptive," he says. "And we've had to do that all too often over the course of the last decade and it's time for it to stop."
Helmholdt says he wants to the state's budget process change so schools can have more secure funding, and they won't face mid-year cuts.
Contact Dustin Dwyer at dtdwyer@umich.edu.
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