JEFFERSON COUNTY, Colo. – School board members in Jefferson County met Thursday evening to discuss the possibility of closing five schools in their district to balance the budget and give teachers a raise.
Peck, Pennington, Pleasant View, Stober and Swanson Elementary are the five schools being proposed to shut down in order to make up for $25 million in the budget.
Closing the schools would save $20 million for the district.
On average, Jefferson County District School employees are paid around $15,000 to $20,000 less per year than other competing metro districts, according to Jefferson County Schools Superintendent Dan McMinimee.
Staff members at these five schools were already notified of the potential closures, but those employees should be able to find jobs elsewhere in the district.
“We're talking probably less than 200 people will be impacted by school closures in terms of staff, so we feel really comfortable that we'll have opportunities for them to fit somewhere else in our system," McMinimee told Denver7’s Mark Boyle last month.
A decision on the closures is not expected to be reached until the end of the month.
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