Lynn ISD prioritizing work in preparation for layoffs

LYNN – Monday will bring several changes to the custodial and maintenance staff at each of the city’s school department facilities as layoffs will force several employees to change buildings.After sending out 35 pink slips last month, seniority and bumping has left the department with 27 official layoffs to go into effect Monday, meaning that Inspectional Services Director Michael Donovan is spending this week getting everything in order for the changes.Donovan said that the high number of layoffs, along with the bumping and bidding process for employees with seniority, means that several employees will be working at a different school come Monday.While the cuts, a result of Gov. Deval Patrick’s latest reduction in local aid funding for cities and towns, will touch every school, Donovan said there will still be plenty of staff available to keep the schools safe and clean.”What we have done is re-distribute the custodians throughout the system,” Donovan said. “We have tried to proportionately reduce the number of custodians across the board so that a school with 10 custodians may only have eight now, or a school with five may only have four.”The city’s larger schools, such as English, Classical and Vocational Technical high schools, are typically staffed with the highest number of custodians, usually 9-10, while the smallest schools can have as few as one custodian on staff.Donovan said every school will have at least one custodian and every day cleaning and maintenance projects will still be done, although the way that work is distributed has been re-worked.”We have prioritized the work, things that have to be done every day, like cleaning bathrooms, cafeterias, emptying trash barrels – anything that is sanitary in nature – will still be done every day,” he said. “Some of the other jobs like sweeping the floors in the hallways may get done every other day, things like that.”ISD is funded to employ 140 custodial and maintenance workers this year, 27 of whom have been laid off effective Monday. In addition, Donovan says about 19-20 workers miss work every day because of sick time or workers compensation claims – a number that has actually shrunk from about 25 per day last year.”Twenty-seven is a large number of people to lay off in any department,” he said. “But proportional to the number of employees we have, it could have been worse.”