The Greenwood School Board is continuing to look at options for outsourcing some district functions, including janitorial services and bus drivers.
The cost-cutting moves, in which outside companies would take over management of those areas, have been under discussion for several months.
At the end of Thursday’s meeting, Bret Reynolds, the district’s business manager, passed out a pamphlet from a Jackson-based janitorial services company. Reynolds said the company was proposing to keep one or two employees on site during the day and then bring in teams to clean the district’s buildings at night.
“I don’t have any cost-benefit analysis yet to see what this might save us,” said Reynolds.
The business manager added that he was still in the early stages of his research and hadn’t yet looked into competing janitorial companies or at options for the district’s school bus services.
School Board President Bill Clay said after the meeting that outsourcing those services would likely save the district significant amounts of money, especially when it came to the costs of employee benefits and retirement.
“We need to look at all our options,” Clay said, referring to the district’s tight budget. “We’re looking at a way we might be able to trim the budget a little bit and still keep the same quality services we’re always had.”
Clay was quick to stress that outsourcing the management of janitorial or bus services wouldn’t necessarily mean that the district’s current employees would lose their jobs.
“Most of the time when these companies come in, they hire the same people,” Clay said.
• Contact Bryn Stole at 581-7235 or bstole@gwcommonwealth.com.
