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Steamboat Springs — The Steamboat Springs School Board gave final approval Monday to the reduction of 34 school district positions, mostly teaching and paraprofessional jobs, in an effort to meet a projected $2 million budget shortfall in the next academic year.

The School Board voted unanimously, twice, to pass two resolutions that finalized the 2010-11 staff reductions through the nonrenewal of contracts for 17 probationary teaching or counseling positions and 17 classified positions, nearly all of which are paraprofessionals. The cuts to probationary staff, or those who have not been with the Steamboat Springs School District for three years, were largest at Steamboat Springs High School, which will lose six teachers next year.

The staff cuts are part of $1.4 million in budget reductions planned for the next school year and presented Monday by Superintendent Shalee Cun­ningham. Although the school district’s budget is not yet finalized, other proposed reductions include 10 percent decreases to district office and school site expenses, elimination of a bus route, elimination of the district’s office manager position, and more.

“This is only a piece of what we’re doing,” School Board member Laura Anderson said about the staff cuts. “We’re trying to find every other way to save money.”

Soda Creek Elementary Scho­ol counselor Valerie McCarthy said her position was not renewed for next year, but she is being transferred to another position in the district. She spoke to the School Board on Monday night at Centennial Hall to plead for the preservation of counselor positions at Soda Creek and Strawberry Park elementary schools. The reductions mean one counselor will work with the more than 800 combined students at the two schools.

McCarthy said she sees at least 60 students a day in classrooms, where she teaches skills such as how to deal with conflicts.

Parent Claire Sollars said she is “terrified at the thought of kids not learning at a very young age … how to cope with problems in today’s society.”

Steamboat Springs resident Stuart Handloff, a former high school drama teacher here, noted that district staff who are let go likely will leave the area and not return when the economy and the district’s budget rebound.

“No one denies that you folks have to make some really, really tough decisions. The money isn’t there, and you can’t invent it,” Handloff told the School Board. “Get rid of anything, but don’t get rid of the people, because they’re irreplaceable.”

School Board member Denise Connelly said 87 percent of the district’s budget goes to personnel costs.

Susie Makens said district staff already are feeling impacts.

“Some of their spouses have lost work, some have put their houses on the market,” Makens said. “I think when you look at the budget, you need to re-look at how you’re dispersing funds.”

School Board President Robin Crossan said the cuts likely will continue for the next two years, meaning additional help from parents and volunteers will be invaluable in classrooms and after-school programs.

“I think in the next two years, we’re going to be really asking our community for help,” she said.

Also Tuesday, the School Board approved the 2010-11 school district calendar and approved, unanimously, the expense of $100,000 to help leverage as much as $5 million in funding for construction of a new North Routt Community Charter School. Those funds are contingent on charter school officials receiving grant funds and on the school site’s final land deed.

The $100,000 would come from the school district’s capital reserve fund. District Finance Director Dale Mellor said that by law, money from that fund must be spent on capital projects and cannot be spent on school district salaries, benefits or other employee-related expenditures.