Santa Clarita / Antelope Valley : Antelope Valley High School District Near Recovery, Fiscal Adviser Says : Finances: A just-approved budget is expected to lead to stability. But officials still expect a tough year.

LANCASTER —  The long-used label “financially troubled” may soon be inappropriate to describe the Antelope Valley Union High School District, which is now solidly on the road to financial recovery, according to the county-assigned fiscal adviser.

Sixteen months ago the 12,500-student high school district became the first in California to have a county fiscal adviser assigned to it under a state law that allows counties to take control of school districts facing insolvency. The Antelope Valley’s only high school district faced a deficit of $14 million.

On Wednesday the Board of Trustees unanimously adopted a budget for the 1993-94 fiscal year, which begins July 1, that, although it reduces the teaching staff by 40, should guide the district back to financial stability.

“We’re at the bottom of the barrel,” said Jim Gardner, president of the Antelope Valley Teachers Assn. “The only way to go is up.”

Administrators are quick to point out, however, that while the future is looking bright, the year ahead will still be a tough one and the state’s funding of education remains unknown.

The high school district was forced to make significant cuts in the 1992-93 fiscal year and virtually every reduction will remain in place this next year with some expected to go even deeper.

Support staff, such as custodians and classroom aides, were cut by 100 about a year ago. Their number will remain at about 340 in the coming year with no further cuts expected.

About 30 teachers were lost through attrition a year ago and not replaced. Another 40 teacher slots have been eliminated as a result of the budget adopted Wednesday, leaving just 315 instructors to teach students at the district’s five comprehensive high schools in spite of increasing enrollment. District enrollment is projected to grow by 580 students in the coming year.

The reduction to the teaching staff, which will occur through attrition and by not rehiring temporary teachers, would result in an average of 45 students in each class.

Through negotiations the district and its teachers union are expected to reach an agreement this summer that would reduce class sizes, which in some cases would otherwise exceed 50 students.

There is more than $600,000 in the budget that has not yet been earmarked for spending and Gardner said it is the position of the union that most, if not all, of any extra funds be spent on teachers to reduce class sizes.

The district is considering offering faculty members a stipend to teach a sixth period. Teachers now teach five of the six periods each day.

Another option is simply hiring more teachers.

The district will also ask the state Department of Education to allow it to have just five periods of instruction next year, a request that officials in Sacramento said would be rejected.

Another option would be for teachers to accept an 11% salary cut in lieu of staff reductions. All district employees received a 7% pay cut in the current year in addition to a reduction in benefits.

Even if the $600,000 is used to lower class sizes, students, teachers and staff will endure other hardships next school year. The complaints about inadequate supplies and insufficient numbers of textbooks are likely to continue. The budget for textbooks is being slashed 30% to about $560,000.

Officials said the year should be easier because there should not be as much confusion. Unlike this past year, the district has a firm understanding of its financial situation, said board President Steve Landaker.

“Under the circumstances it’s the best we can expect,” he said.

The district, for example, expects to have the money in the coming year to replace school windows broken by vandals with glass. Wood is now being put up in place of broken windows since it is cheaper.

Longtime district trustee Wilda Andrejcik said that in spite of the reductions, a good education is still available through the high school district to those students who are interested.

“I don’t think we’re clipping anyone’s wings,” she said.

But class sizes have gotten bigger, students have to pay to ride the bus, a moratorium on new programs will continue, spending on capital outlay such as equipment will be suspended and the district will no longer pay for athletic and extracurricular transportation.

Norm Miller, the fiscal adviser assigned to the high school district by the county, said the district is on its way to a financial recovery.

An indication of the district’s financial soundness will be when Miller leaves the district. Already Miller has cut back his work week from five days to three and he expects some time during the coming school year to be gone for good.

The district this year will pay off the second half of an $8-million loan it received from Los Angeles County. Administrators said that the more than $4.3 million in the budget for the payoff will be available in 1994-95 to reinstate programs.

Miller said: “The district has come a long way toward fiscal recovery in the past year.”