The House-approved budget for PSS amounted to $38.2 million, but this was reduced by $2 million by the Senate version.
The House and Senate have already convened a conference committee to draft a compromise version of the fiscal year 2009 budget bill.
During last week’s BOE meeting, the board’s fiscal and personnel affairs committee chairman Herman T. Guerrero said there’s a need to point out to lawmakers the importance of having a budget that allows PSS to hire the teaching personnel it needs.
“The Senate version is not supporting the PSS mandates,” he said. “It has too many restrictions that in the end would greatly impact our school operations.”
In a letter to the Legislature, BOE Chairwoman Lucy Blanco-Maratita and Commissioner of Education Rita A. Sablan said the House proposal is “far superior.”
They said several provisions in the Senate bill will affect the teaching and learning of students — the austerity holidays, unpaid holidays, hiring freeze, and the conversion of all non-managerial PSS staff to civil service status.
Guerrero said these provisions will affect not only the hiring capability of PSS, which is trying to address its shortage of teachers, but also its federally funded employees.
“It doesn’t make sense that a principal who is the captain of the ship will be told not to go on board because of these austerity measures,” Guerrero said.
Blanco-Maratita and Sablan said every year, PSS recruits between 45 and 60 new teachers and related educational support service personnel.
They said the Senate version of the budget bill will prevent PSS from hiring any teaching and related service personnel in FY 2009.
The bill, they added, will hinder BOE’s constitutional mandate to provide free compulsory public education to the nearly 11,000 children attending public schools.
They asked the Senate and the House to omit “the objectionable provisions” and pass the House budget bill.
