Despite a multimillion-dollar fundraising campaign, a parcel tax approved last summer and three straight years of budget cuts, Palos Verdes Peninsula schools are now faced with another major financial shortfall.

The Hill's 12,000-student school district - one of the state's highest-achieving - needs to cut $4 million in 2010-11 and $3 million the year after that.

Last week, layoff notices went out to 90 teachers, and the school board is still weighing how many nonteaching positions to eliminate.

The layoffs come a year after 40 teachers were eliminated, as were about 40 jobs such as teaching aides, support staff and other positions, many of them part time.

"We've used whatever tricks we could, pulled whatever rabbits out of our hat that we could," said Superintendent Walker Williams at a board meeting last week. "We're looking at everything."

Tonight, school officials will explain potential cuts to the district's $90 million budget at a town hall meeting, which is designed to elicit suggestions from residents regarding which programs should be preserved and where to find new revenue sources.

Like other school districts across the state, Palos Verdes Peninsula Unified is facing serious cuts because it relies overwhelmingly on state funding, which has been slashed for several years.

Some districts have been able to soften the blow of reductions - partly with the help of federal