BRIDGEPORT — Chicago Public Schools this week announced $120 million in cuts — a bad-news scenario for which many neighborhood schools prepared.
“We anticipated a doomsday situation,” said Joe Trutin, community representative of Armour School’s Local School Council. “It’s always been about planning ahead and crossing your fingers and hoping it’s not going to be any worse than it has been in the past.”
The cuts were $20 million more than CPS Forrest Claypool had originally proposed, marking an average 1.5-percent budget cut at schools across the city.
Locally, the schools losing the highest percentage of their overall budgets are Bronzeville Urban Prep, which lost $83,629, or 2.27 percent of its budget, and Pershing East, which lost $70,271, or 2.43 percent of its budget. Beasley Elementary took the largest cash hit of $145,623, or 2 percent of its budget.
Several principals did not return calls to comment on how they’re planning to deal with the cuts.
Local School Council officials said schools have been preparing for the worst, using rainy day funds to avoid cutting teachers and programs.
“Schools have been banking whatever money they can for the last three years,” said Jennie Biggs, a Bridgeport parent and board member of education-advocacy organization Raise Your Hand.
But even after factoring in federal grants and leftover state funds from previous years, many schools will have hundreds of thousands of dollars taken away.
The district's 2015-16 budget included a $480 million hole Claypool hoped could be plugged through state funding by the new year. But with few signs of movement in Springfield, the schools chief said, CPS has no choice but to make cuts.
“These painful reductions are not the steps that we want to take, but they are the steps we must take as our cash position becomes tighter every day — especially as the District relies on short-term financing to pay its bills," Claypool said in a written statement Tuesday. "We are doing everything in our power to sustain the gains our students are making in their classrooms.”
Biggs, who also serves on the school council at the Mark Sheridan Math & Science Academy, said these are likely the first of many bad budget days.
“It’s going to get worse,” Biggs said. “There’s no more money to bank.”
Though solutions often seem in short supply, Biggs said she hopes parents will continue pushing city councilmen to call for TIF district surplus money to be used to offset school cuts.
Here’s a look at a round-up of the cuts anticipated at schools in the Bridgeport area:
ACE Technical Charter School is set to lose $66,546.94, or 1.98 percent of its budget.
Air Force High School, $33,494, 1.55 percent
Armour School, $21,966, 1.35 percent
Back of the Yards High School, $966,855, 1.78 percent
Beethoven Elementary, $24,186, .97 percent
Beasley, $145,623, 1.99 percent
Bronzeville High School, $37,804, 1.24 percent
Bronzeville Urban Prep, $83,629, 2.72 percent
Chavez Elementary, $79,035, 1.39 percent
Daley Elementary, $42,258, 1.16 percent
Dewey, $10,126, .48 percent
Doolittle East, $17,031, .98 percent
Evergreen Elementary, $22,033, 1.15 percent
Graham Elementary, 41,432, 1.54 percent
Graham High School, +$17,204, 9.25 percent
Haines, $67,071, 1.84 percent
Hamline, $50,416, 1.37 percent
Healy, $139,874, 1.64 percent
Hedges, $45,492, 1.12 percent
Hendricks, +$17,898, 1.28 percent
Holden, $37,088, 1.31 percent
Lara Academy, $28,982, 1.49 percent
Arthur A. Libby, $13,252, .56 percent
McClellan, $22,960, 1.53 percent
Pershing East, $70,271, 2.43 percent
Richards Career Academy, $13,582, .63 percent
Seward, $50,566, 1.04 percent
Sheridan, $54,293, 1.81 percent
Sherman Elementary School, $143, .01 percent
Thomas Elementary, +$12,148, 8.52 percent
Tilden, $11,251, .55 percent
James Ward, $65,045, 2.2 percent
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