Maybe you can double park and leave the engine running for this early evening special School Board meeting at 6:15 in the Lin Howe School cafetorium, 4100 Irving Pl.
Business could be completed in as little as 60 minutes.
Shrinking state funding has brought school districts the length of the state to their knees, and now the hometown version comes to Culver City.
Personnel cuts are the only subject on the antic-climactic agenda, having been postponed from a week ago tonight when the Board ran out of time.
Five Board members control the fate 50 persons, teachers and support staff, many of whom have presented their pleas face-to-face.
All five presumably made up their minds days ago on what proportion of the 50 reasonably can be rescued. Applying recent history as a barometer, most of the 19.2 vulnerable teaching positions should be safely reeled in.
“Hopefully, we will just be discussing budget cuts tonight,” said Board President Scott Zeidman. “If things go as expected, we will agree to some and probably not agree to others.”
David Mielke, President of the Teachers Union, this morning was asked for his perspective on the meeting:
“Who knows?” he told the newspaper. “It can be a good sign when a Board postpones a vote. Or, it can be a managment tactic to make sure they get to vote in front of what will be a smaller crowd. At this point, with this Board, we're really working on candidates for November.
“Two Board seats are up (Steve Gourley’s and Scott Zeidman’s). Community members are coming to us talking about running. Clearly, people in the community disagree with this Board's priorities —“cut everyone but management.”
