A Temporary 'Safe Harbor' for 23 Schools That Lost Title I Funding

From School Board Member Tamar Galatzan:

In an effort to dull the financial pain for 23 schools that lost Title I funding for next year, Board Member Tamar Galatzan asked Superintendent John Deasy to look into a federal “safe harbor” provision that would allow the District to continue to partially fund these schools for one year. On Friday, Deasy announced that such a provision does exist within the No Child Left Behind Act, and he asked for money to be allocated for them for the 2012-2013 school year.

 “In view of the ever-worsening state fiscal crisis and the need to identify transitional support for the 23 campuses, I directed staff to prepare a one-time “hold harmless” allocation for each of the schools,” Deasy wrote to Board Members.

The restored funds are only a portion of the funds these schools formerly received under Title I, but they will allow these schools time to transition to their new status as non-Title I, Galatzan said.

“This is a short term solution to help the 23 district schools who just lost as much as hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding for next year,” said Galatzan, the one board member who voted against the change in policy. “The sudden loss of Title I funds at these schools will be immediate and devastating. It is our duty as a district to try to help them find both short-term and long-term solutions.”

Editor's Note: Schools impacted in Chatsworth are Superior Street Elementary and Germain Street School. .

Title I money refers to federally mandated funds that must be used for the nation’s most impoverished students, who are eligible for free and reduced lunch. The funds are designed to provide schools with additional funding to help students overcome obstacles of poverty, and can be used to pay for more teachers, counseling, interventions, or instructional materials.

Until this year, Los Angeles Unified schools that had at least 40% of the student body that qualified for free and reduced lunch were eligible for extra funding. The amount of extra money a school receives can range from $100,000 for a small elementary school, to close to $600,000 for a middle school like Millikan, to over $762,000 for a high school like Hamilton.

But with less money coming from the federal government, in December the School Board voted 6-1 to raise the Title I threshold from 40% of the student body, to 50%, with Galatzan as the lone dissenting vote.

The $5 million saved by cutting Title I funding to the 23 schools was to be redistributed to schools where at least 75% of the students are impoverished. The bulk of the money will still be redistributed, with a small amount set aside for the “safe harbor” funds.

The 23 schools were not notified in advance of the cuts, nor told that their paperwork would be used to determine funding for the next year. At Sherman Oaks Center for Enriched Studies in the San Fernando Valley has 49.07% of the student body are Title I, meaning the school missed the cut-off by six students.

Since the December vote, parents and principals from across the district have begged the School Board to reconsider, speaking at board meetings and inundating board offices with emails and phone calls.

“We still need to help these schools find a long-term solution—whether by coming up with a new funding formula, or studying which programs are most effective so we can fund those,” Galatzan said. “In the meantime, though, funds from safe harbor give these schools—and the district—time to come up with a fair, and well-thought out new strategy.”

Galatzan made clear that there is only a set amount of money for all Title I schools across the district. Giving these 23 schools back some money does mean other schools will get less.

“There is a set amount of Title I money for all our neediest students,” Galatzan said. “For one year we will be spreading that money a little thinner.”