In compliance with statewide budget cuts mandated by Gov. Jim Gibbons, the Nye County school board approved hacking off $490,284 from the 2007-2008 budget draft at its Feb. 21 meeting.

Due to a statewide shortfall discovered last December, Gibbons mandated a 4.5 percent reduction in all state budgets including public education funding.

In an effort to mitigate the fiscal damage and have as little direct impact on students as possible, state superintendents held a number of meetings with the governor, his staff and state education and budget officials and requested that the brunt of the cuts be taken from education initiatives that had not yet been funded.

Deferring the programs has resulted in Nye County having to cut its budget by the above amount, as opposed to the $1.4 million the governor's 4.5 percent reductions would have originally cost.

Nonetheless, in a state where education has historically been underfunded, returning money is a bitter pill for any school board to have to swallow, but that's exactly what was needed to meet the requirements.

The board approved returning a $10,000 district Empowerment Schools Planning grant to the Department of Education, in addition to a competitive portion -- $13,964.14-- of state funds that would have gone to the Information and Technology program.

The adult high school program will return $100,000, but the memo outlining the budget cuts states the slash in revenue "will not have an adverse affect on the program in its entirety."

The remaining $366,319.86 will be taken from the district's ending fund balance of the general fund.

In an earlier response to the budget cuts, Nye County Superintendent Rob Roberts had enacted an emergency freeze on hiring, but that has since been lifted and the district will continue to pursue filling its vacancies.