Live Oak School District to appoint board member, vote on lease agreement with Community Bridges

The Live Oak School District governing board has a full agenda for its Wednesday meeting, including appointing a new board member to a vacant seat, voting on a lease agreement with nonprofit Community Bridges and approving an updated list of layoffs. 

Lauren Pomrantz, the teachers union co-president, said the district is still in flux as it tries to recover from a budget crisis.  

“Everything is still very uncertain,” she said. “[We’re hopeful] we’ll see some stability as people transition into new positions at the district office, and if that stabilizes, that we’ll be able to understand a little bit more about what the outlook is.”

For the past several months, staff and the governing board have been working on a stabilization plan of layoffs and other cost-saving measures to steer the district out of a multimillion-dollar deficit. However, as various factors, including state funding and enrollment, continue to evolve, the district has made adjustments to its plan, including reducing the number of layoffs it has to make. 

On Wednesday evening at Green Acres Elementary School, the board will vote on an updated list of layoffs for its teachers and for its classified staff, which includes custodians, librarians and yard-duty supervisors. Pomrantz said that as part of the resolution to be voted on, five teachers are being laid off. However, she added, 17 teachers who are on annual temporary contracts – meaning their contracts expire at the end of the year – are also not being renewed. She said that in a typical year, the number of temporary contracts that are not renewed is lower. 

Previously, nine teachers were going to be laid off. However, three are being reassigned to other teaching jobs and one will be the new part-time principal at Ocean Alternative School, whose principal is retiring in June. 

In addition, the board will vote on an updated list of layoffs for classified staff, which also includes reassignments. The list shows that out of 42 layoffs of classified employees, 25 employees are either being reassigned, demoted or are taking a voluntary reduction in lieu of a layoff. 

Pomrantz said the teachers union is still advocating that the district save more of the classified positions, especially the family liaisons. Family liaisons, who are all bilingual, welcome families in front offices and check in with families whose students are missing school.

“The impact of their loss to their working group is similar to our loss,” Pomrantz said of the classified union. “Which is that students deserve adults to help them thrive, and we’re seeing a record loss across the district.” 

Pomrantz emphasized that the updated layoffs the board is voting on might not be final and that LOSD might still be able to save positions as it sees changes to the budget. In that case, district officials would ask those being laid off if they’re interested in interviewing for the role.

“If their positions do materialize, those individuals will be called back to interview for positions if they want to,” said Pomrantz. 

In addition to voting on the new updated layoffs, the governing board will interview candidates for a vacant seat after board member Paul Garcia resigned last month. His resignation comes after several months of turmoil and departures. 

In February, the assistant superintendent of human resources resigned, and in early March the assistant superintendent of business services told the board during a meeting to investigate Superintendent Daisy Morales after he said she fired him without reason. Then, in mid-March, Morales announced her resignation, saying in a letter to the district she felt “a deep sense of responsibility” for the months of crisis. 

The candidates for the open board seat include Tammy Summers, Stacey Kyle and Tara Rous. Another candidate, Jim Toohey, told Lookout he dropped out of the race after he saw that “excellent candidates” had applied for the role. 

Summers isn’t currently employed but is an active parent in the district and previously worked for local nonprofit Dientes Community Dental. Kyle is also a parent in the district and works as an independent consultant. She founded the Live Oak Education Foundation in 2012. Rous is a nurse practitioner who previously worked for two other local school districts. 

Pomrantz said representatives from the teachers union met with two of the candidates: Summers and Kyle. She said their commitment to the district and to rebuilding trust provided a “glimmer of hope” for her. 

“We’re hopeful,” she said. “It’s like the best of any of the scenarios where you have two really good candidates.” 

Pomrantz said she isn’t familiar with Rous, but added that she hopes that applicants who aren’t selected Wednesday will run for open seats in the November election. Three seats are up for reelection. 

The agenda also includes two contentious and related items: a discussion on a potential workforce housing bond and a lease agreement with Community Bridges. Community Bridges is one of the tenants at a property, located at 1777 Capitola Rd., that the district has said it plans to develop for workforce housing. 

The district first gave the tenants an eviction notice about two years ago. Since then, the two sides have been in tense negotiations over a lease agreement and the future use of the site. 

Pomrantz said that the teachers union, Live Oak Elementary Teachers Association, doesn’t understand why the potential workforce housing bond discussion is on the agenda, as workforce housing is costly and “doesn’t necessarily serve the needs of the teachers.” Pomrantz said the proposed development could be a better fit for young and single teachers – which isn’t the district’s demographic. 

“We’re concerned that it’s still being brought up as this initiative that we’re going to pour money into when our district [enrollment] is declining and shrinking,” she said. “Our job will just be to make sure that they are constantly aware of the impact financially to create something like that.” 

Community Bridges CEO Raymon Cancino told Lookout he was happy to see that the district is willing to agree to a two-year lease agreement, but added that he’s disappointed in other aspects of the agreement. For example, he said, the district is asking the organization to agree to pay for repairs, like repaving the parking lot, and wants to prevent it from using a room for dining. 

Community Bridges operates its Meals on Wheels program out of the building, providing daily meals for about 1,500 older adults. Meals on Wheels has been operating at the site, known as the Live Oak Senior Center, since 1977.

If the board adopts the lease agreement, which Cancino expects it will, he said Community Bridges will consider signing the agreement but with some changes. 

“I think the current document we have now is a document we can’t sign,” he said. “But the issues are so minor that we’ll be willing to sign, with amendments.” 

The district’s bond consultant, Isom Advisors, will give a presentation Wednesday about potential bond amounts, planning and a timeline. The consultant estimates that the district can pursue a bond amount of between $29 million and $46 million toward workforce housing. 

In order to meet filing deadlines for the November election, the governing board will have to adopt a resolution to go forward with a ballot measure by Aug. 9. If it doesn’t, the next opportunity wouldn’t be until June 2026. 

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