[KHTS] – Castaic Union parents gathered Thursday for the third of four community meetings by school district officials explaining how the relatively small K-8 found itself in such dire financial straits.

From attendance programs to fast-food fundraisers to a financial plan, parents are already bringing and receiving answers to questions, but the message was clear: There are going to be more cuts, and they’re going to hurt.

The district is in the process of negotiating a little over $4.1 million in deficit reductions to get itself back on steady financial footing, after being rocked by what officials were solemnly referring to as “a perfect storm” of political and financial factors.

“It was the perfect storm of bad things happening to us,” said Superintendent James Gibson, “in the same place at the same time.”

First, there was the enrollment drop-off — a loss of more than 300 students in the last three years, more than 15 percent of the district’s total population.

The district receives about $9,000 for each student, meaning the 319 students lost since 2012 come to nearly $3 million in lost revenue, he explained. And the students are going to places like Dallas, Nashville and New York, Gibson said Thursday, not Burbank or Newhall.

The district made it by through these tough times for the first two school years with intradistrict loans, but was no longer an option at the start of this past school year.

Then, there’s the Local Control Funding Formula, or LCFF.

The funding formula proposed by Gov. Jerry Brown and adopted by the Legislature last school year offers significantly more to those districts with student populations that cost more to educate, such as schools with a higher English as a Second Language population, more crowded classrooms and a large population of free-lunch students.

The Castaic Union School District has less, or more, depending on how you look at it, but Gibson said it’s caused CUSD to be what some consider “an LCFF loser,” i.e. while CUSD gets less than $10,000 per pupil annually, Palmdale and LAUSD schools get closer to $14,000.

The school also is actually penalized financially under the state’s new system because districts are rewarded for reducing student-to-teacher ratios, and CUSD already had the lowest number countywide — 18.3-to-1 as of Monday, according to Department of Education data.

An audit report recently detailed how internal borrowing delayed painful cuts at the elementary and junior high school district, resulting in the need for the recently approved fiscal recovery plan for the district.

Those cuts now include the layoff of more than 40 staffers district-wide, teachers and classified employees, to get rid of the deficit.

“Some of those people are my friends, and I had to go and give them layoff notices,” Gibson said, “so I get it. It’s been tough.”

Two board members also addressed erroneous rumors Gibson recently received a $30,000 raise and that administrative staff would be immune from pay cuts that were also being presented to teachers.

A few of the cuts the board recently approved include: $4.1 million from the operating budget through: layoffs for 30 teachers throughout the district ($2.36 million); a reduction in classified staff, the equivalent of 13 full-time positions ($417,000); reductions in administrative staff expected to save more than $340,000; $50,000 in reduced transportation services; and a reduction of $300,000 in services each year.

The district also decided to move its sixth-grade classrooms to the elementary school, from the middle school, which is expected to save a little more than $230,000, starting next year.

Additional cuts were deemed necessary, and district officials are working with the teachers’ union to determine whether that will be in the form of four furlough days — which would be felt by administration, as well — or another 3.5 layoffs.

The audits and reports from Michele McClowry, a CPA working for the Los Angeles County Office of Education who’s helped the last 14 schools she’s been at recover from a fiscal crisis avoid state takeover — both cleared district officials of any misappropriation or malfeasance with respect to the district’s budget woes, said board member David Huffaker.

And the response to the fiscal crisis outside the district office has been of the all-hands-on-deck variety, as well.

The district’s informational meeting Thursday afternoon was preceded by a PTA meeting where the executive board saw much more attendance, and financial questions, than usual.

Northlake Hills Principal Erin Augusta was invited to speak at the PTA meeting and thanked parents for helping in the school’s March Madness Attendance push — the school reduced last month’s absences from 24 to 16.

It might not seem like much, but absences cost the school about $88,000 this year alone, officials said, and at a time when every penny is especially vital, every cost reduction or savings count.

“I think it kind of made an impression on a lot of us,” Augusta said to parents. “We get (state funding) by the number of kids in their chairs each day.”

The parents are also planning a fundraiser at the Castaic Telly’s Drive-in on March 12 at 5:30 p.m.

Everyone is working toward the same end, said Castaic Union board member Laura Pearson, who also spoke with parents. The school district is working with parents, teachers, administrators and classified staff to reach a $4.1 million savings goal, and avoid a worst-case scenario — having the state take over the district, meaning parents, teachers and staff would forfeit any real influence over the decision-making process, she said.

“There’s a lot of people helping, but right now we have to have a plan in place for next year,” Gibson said, “that’s what we have to give to the county.”