LEE COUNTY, Fla. — At Tuesday's Lee County School Board meeting, board members approved a plan to make $15.9 million in savings by cutting 5% of each department's budget and restructuring the district.
Board member Debbie Jordan, who represents district 4, was the only board member to vote no.
"The 5%, I have asked numerous times for, and I wanted to see where is that being taken from and how does that affect the outcomes of our students?," Jordan asked.
On March 28, the district announced the cuts, but didn't explain where the money would come from.
Find previous reporting on that here.
Jordan said she still hasn't gotten an answer about the budget numbers.
Watch Lee County Community Correspondent Ella Rhoades' report below:
Fox 4 made a public records request and reached out to the district. We have not received any records yet, and the district just repeated what it initially said — that it made a 5% cut.
India Palencia, a parent, said she's happy the district is being frugal.
"It's a good thing where we might not need personnel or kind of trimming and making sure that we're running a efficiently," Palencia said.
She shares the same concern as board member Jordan.
"If they're not presenting the math to us, that's not transparent," Palencia said. "They should go to math teachers and math teachers teach them how to show their work because I know my little third grader comes home, and he brings math homework home, and he has to show his work."
The Lee County School District has said from the start these changes, "do not impact school-based teachers or support staff."
"No matter what changes we make, no matter what we do, every change is going to impact a student," Palencia said.
As for the restructuring, the biggest change Jordan noticed is there will no longer be a Director of School Psychology and Social Services.
The new chain of command puts it under the Director of Physical and Mental Health Services.
Read about the new job positions here.
"Counselors, the psychologists, who is gonna manage them...they need to make sure that they have that the right supervision over them to make sure that our children are adequately taken care of," Jordan said.
Fox 4 will update you when we receive the budget records request.
