Santa Ana recants previous statement

Newport-Mesa Unified School District officials did not initiate the discussion about phasing out a program for deaf and hard of hearing students as a Santa Ana Unified School District representative said recently.

A Santa Ana Unified spokeswoman who said it was Newport-Mesa officials who approached Santa Ana about winding down the program at Kaiser Elementary said Tuesday she was mistaken and apologized.

Santa Ana district officials now emphasize they made the initial contact with Newport-Mesa to withdraw their students and put them in a program in Santa Ana Unified. Educators in both districts say they are working hard together to resolve the issue.

The issue erupted last week when it was reported that Santa Ana wanted to educate its hearing-impaired students in the district to save money. Withdrawing the students would take the majority of students away from Newport-Mesa.

By next school year, parents and guardians of students living outside the district will have to use a different program, while Newport-Mesa students will be taught individually.

“We initiated a conversation with Diana Casato [Newport-Mesa’s director of special education] looking at the kids we have over at Newport-Mesa,” Santa Ana assistant Supt. Doreen Lohnes said.

The majority of students enrolled in the program at Kaiser Elementary were Santa Ana students. When the district decided to pull its students back, Newport-Mesa then decided to reevaluate the program, officials said.

After that evaluation, the district decided to serve only students living within its district on an individual basis, officials said.

Parents and teachers have spoken out against the move because they fear the program in Santa Ana will not compare to Newport-Mesa’s program, which specializes in students with hearing aids or cochlear implants who do not use sign language or lip reading.

Santa Ana officials say their program at Taft Elementary will be comparable to Newport-Mesa’s.

“I am open to continue the dialogue with our parents so that we could work with them and have a mutual understanding and trust,” Lohnes said.

Parents are blaming budget issues for the moves made by both districts. Neither district denies that money is a concern, but officials say those budget concerns don’t drive the decisions.

“I think there are a lot of issues relative to this issue,” Newport-Mesa spokeswoman Laura Boss said. “It’s always the goal to have students return to their neighborhood schools. It has proven to be beneficial to all of our students.”

Paul Reed, Newport-Mesa’s deputy superintendent, said money remains a concern for the district even if it’s not the main reason behind the decisions.

“This was taking money from kids in Newport-Mesa to help other kids [living outside the district],” he said. “This is not a defensible position during a budget crunch.”

The cost to educate all the children in the program cost more than Santa Ana, and other school districts, were reimbursing Newport-Mesa for each student, which was about the same the state would pay per child enrolled in a district, $5,700, Reed said.

Newport-Mesa does not get state funds from students enrolled in a program who live outside its district, Reed said.

Some teachers and parents have asked the district to entice other outside district students to fill the void the departing Santa Ana students will leave. But that won’t work, Reed said.

“It would exacerbate the problem,” he said. “You don’t make money on special education.”

A deaf and hard of hearing program at Costa Mesa High School that is also affected by a majority of Santa Ana students leaving is being reviewed further by Newport-Mesa Supt. Jeffrey Hubbard.

Newport-Mesa was going to make the program individualized for its three in-district students, forcing students enrolled from other districts to find a new program at the end of the current school year. That decision has now been put on hold pending the superintendent’s decision.

DANIEL TEDFORD may be reached at (714) 966-4632 or at daniel.tedford@latimes.com.