A $6.03 billion budget for the 2012-2013 fiscal year was approved Thursday by the Los Angeles Unified School District Board of
Education.
The vote was 6-1.
The budget closed a $390 million deficit the district faced entering the
fiscal year, which begins Sunday, according to Tom Waldman, the district's
The board's 6-1 vote, with South Bay representative Richard Vladovic dissenting, capped an 11th-hour scramble to salvage the Beyond the Bell after-school program. It operates from 3-6 p.m. weekdays at every elementary and middle school in the district.
About $4 million will come from money the district had set aside to put a parcel tax on the 2013 ballot--although district officials are still considering that plan--and the balance from an unexpected surplus in preschool revenue in the state budget that Gov. Jerry Brown signed on Wednesday.
Superintendent John Deasy credited teachers and other unionized
employees for choosing to cut their salaries by working fewer days to allow the
district to reduce spending significantly.
