ST. LOUIS COUNTY, Mo. — Just one week after the Webster Groves School District proposed an early teacher retirement plan, they've shut it down.
"At the end of the day (we) didn't feel like it would be in the best interest of the district to move forward and really the reason for that is it becomes harder and harder to hire people these days," Simpson said.
If incentive plan would've went forward, it would've allowed 55 eligible teachers to retire early with the district buying them out.
During a special school board meeting Friday afternoon, John Simpson, the district's superintendent, said he was concerned.
March is the month that teachers sign their contracts for the next school year.
"There's a federal law that requires any type of plan such like this to be made available to staff for 45 days," Simpson said.
Federal law also requires another seven days after that to revoke their acceptance.
Which would mean the district wouldn't know how many employees would take the offer until the beginning of April.
Saying no to the incentive plan still leaves the district searching for ways to recoup revenue loss.
Officials estimate next year the district will lose $2 million in revenue. Pam Frazier, the district's chief financial officer, said the district is trying to get create with how they save money.
"One of the things we're diving into right now is, doing a survey to look at all the software programs in the district. Are we duplicating any services? Can we, save money if there's a product being used by multiple buildings," Frazier said.
The district said they've also reduced their budget, and will fill less positions based on enrollment numbers.
Meanwhile the superintendent said they are willing to discuss a possible early retirement plan in the next school year as they continue to look for ways to decrease their loss of revenue.
"It would certainly be something that we would be bringing much sooner to the board for consideration than when we did this year," Simpson said.
Eighty percent of the Webster Groves School District's budget goes towards paying employees.
The district said they'll continue to meet with their budget planning committee to address revenue losses.