Layoffs loom as Lynn teachers union votes on furloughs

LYNN – Members of the Lynn Teachers Union will meet today to discuss the possibility of taking one furlough day in the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2009 to save dozens of classroom teachers from being laid off.Facing a $2.7 million fourth-quarter cut from Gov. Deval Pat-rick, Mayor Edward J. Clancy Jr. has spread the reduction across all city departments, reducing the city’s education budget by $1 million.While administrators have been able to shave that $1 million in half with non-salary reductions, they are still faced with a $500,000 hole in the budget that, unless city unions agree to a furlough day, will be closed with sweeping layoffs.Teachers Union President Alice Gunning confirmed that members would meet today, but would not say if she expected the membership to vote at the meeting. Several other department sources have confirmed a vote will take place.Even if the teachers vote to accept the furlough day, the idea must still gain approval from the School Committee. Clancy, the School Committee chairman, has made it abundantly clear he will only support the move if all unions in the city agree to it and if the city does not have to eventually pay back the free day.”If people want to make sacrifices to save jobs that is up to them,” Clancy said Tuesday. “I will go along with any idea that saves jobs and saves money, but it has to actually save money.”One hanging point is the idea the teachers want to be paid back for the day at the end of their contracts, a request Clancy has balked at.Gunning returned from a conference in Texas last week with hope that President Barack Obama’s federal stimulus package would provide funding for the Lynn Public Schools, and implied that if that happened, the union would expect payback.”We are willing to work with the city, but if more money comes in we would expect the city to work with us,” Gunning said Monday, declining to comment on the negotiations with Clancy further. “I don’t want our members hurt and I don’t want the kids hurt.”If the vote passes today, the issue will go before the School Committee for final approval next week.The next scheduled committee meeting was to be held Thursday, but with Clancy and Committee member Vincent Spirito out of town, the committee has rescheduled the meeting for Wednesday, Feb. 18.If the furlough day is defeated, the number of layoffs in the department could reach triple digits and include everyone from clerks and support staff to teachers and administrators.Because of the delay in a School Committee vote, Superintendent Catherine Latham said Tuesday that layoff notices will go out Thursday regardless of the union vote, and if the School Committee eventually approves the furlough day, those layoffs could be rescinded.Latham has called an emergency principals meeting for Thursday morning to discuss layoffs and said principals and administrators would personally deliver the notices along with mailing them to each employee’s home.The superintendent says she is still working with the union and principals to finalize the final list of layoffs, although some sources within the school department say that most principals and teachers have a good idea of who is being cut and how classrooms will be combined for the rest of the year.The budget cuts have already forced the police department to pull School Resource Officers from the hallways of the city’s secondary schools to spell overtime and avoid layoffs in that department, and a hiring freeze has left holes in several key administrative positions, including deputy superintendent, a position the department did not fill when Latham was promoted to superintendent.In no uncertain terms, the layoffs would come at the worst possible time for the school department, as the day the changes go into effect, March 16, is right before students begin taking MCAS tests.Gunning said Monday she hoped her membership and the city could come to a viable agreement if not just to save money, then to save the students from di