YOUNGSTOWN District prepares to close 2 schools

The superintendent said there will be a districtwide reduction in staff.
By JoANNE VIVIANO
VINDICATOR EDUCATION WRITER
YOUNGSTOWN -- As the Youngstown City School District prepares to open two new elementary schools in the fall, it is making plans for the permanent closure of two other schools.
The new Harding Elementary School on the city's North Side and the new Taft Elementary School on the South Side will be open for kindergarten through fourth-grade pupils, said Tony DeNiro Jr., executive director of school business affairs. Closing will be Bennett Elementary School, currently housed in the Princeton Avenue building on the city's South Side, and the Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School on Covington Street on the North Side.
Pupils from the closed schools will attend either one of the new buildings or one of three other buildings.
"We need to start this process," DeNiro said. "This is the way the master plan was supposed to work."
What's planned
Part of the plan includes returning East Side pupils, who were bused to Bennett, back to their neighborhoods, DeNiro said. He added that the children were transferred to Bennett when Roosevelt School closed in the 1990s and will go back to Mary Haddow School on the East Side.
Further, pupils from the current Williamson School also will be relocated so the South Side school can be demolished and rebuilt.
Harding, at Cordova and Benita avenues, and Taft, at Gibson Street and Avondale Avenue, are being built at a cost of about $6.8 million each. They are part of a $200 million project to rebuild or remodel 15 district buildings. The project is funded 80 percent by the Ohio School Facilities Commission; remaining funding comes from a district share, of which the bulk is derived from a local 4.4-mill bond issue passed in November 1999.
Staff reduction
Superintendent Benjamin L. McGee said closings will cause a districtwide reduction in staff at all levels. The number of staff that will be laid off has not yet been determined.
"There are a number of positions open that we've filled with substitutes, so the actual loss of jobs will be minimal as to the closing of the schools," McGee said. "There will be some cuts in the teaching staff. We're trying to minimize layoffs with retirements."
DeNiro said the district is working with both the Youngstown Education Association teachers union and the district chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. He said they will begin meeting with staff soon.
McGee said the district and the YEA have reached an agreement to offer teachers a monetary incentive to announce planned retirements early so plans for staff changes can be made as soon as possible. He said the agreement has not been approved by the board and declined to discuss specifics.
As for administrative positions, McGee said some contracts would not be renewed because of the fewer number of buildings. However, he added, the nonrenewals would not likely affect the principals currently at the Bennett and Martin Luther King Jr. Schools.
Small schools
Further staff adjustments will be coming as the district moves into its small schools initiative. The initiative seeks to create three smaller school communities within both Chaney High School and the new East Middle School, which should open in fall 2005. Each of the high schools will employ academic deans to oversee each of the three smaller units and staff will be adjusted accordingly, McGee said.