The mudslinging over who is responsible for the Clark County School District’s estimated $60 million budget deficit shifted to Superintendent Pat Skorkowsky this week, furthering a blame game that shows no end in sight and prompting him to respond.

The latest finger-pointing began Tuesday when the union that represents school administrators and professional-technical employees issued a four-page letter blasting Skorkowsky for his handling of the district’s budget and treatment of employees.

Skorkowsky sent an email apology laced with clarifications to colleagues — including school trustees, state Superintendent Steve Canavero and state Senate Minority Leader Michael Roberson — on Wednesday evening, noting that he was “disheartened and shocked” to see unions trying to “capitalize on our budget shortfall for political gain.”

The union letter — written by Stephen Augspurger, executive director of the Clark County Association of School Administrators and Professional-Technical Employees (CCASAPE) — alleges that deficit-spending was already occurring in April and May when the trustees approved tentative and final budgets.

The district didn’t announce its deficit until early July and has blamed it primarily on lower-than-expected state revenue and costs associated with an arbitration victory for CCASAPE that created additional expenses for the district in terms of retroactive pay increases and higher salaries going forward.

Trustees approved a roughly $43 million chop to this year’s fiscal budget last month, but the district has said nearly $80 million in cuts may be necessary to shore up the estimated $60 million shortfall.

“While unanticipated expenses occurred after the approval of these two budgets, these events should have been anticipated and contingency plans put into place,” Augspurger wrote. “This did not occur, and it is likely that the current deficit stems from a long period of mismanagement and misappropriation by the Superintendent, far greater than the unanticipated expenses identified in the initial $34.5 million deficit reported by the Superintendent.”

The letter went on to accuse Skorkowsky of damaging the district’s credibility, bullying some administrators and doing nothing to improve staff morale, among other things. It also calls on the trustees — the elected body charged with directing the superintendent and ensuring student success — to hold Skorkowsky accountable.

“The circumstances are such that if decisive action is not quickly taken by the Trustees, then state intervention will be inevitable,” Augspurger wrote.

During a school board work session Wednesday, Trustee Chris Garvey suggested making the letter a discussion item at a future meeting. The idea wasn’t met with support from some other board members, including Trustee Linda Young, who worried it might create a slippery slope and force the board into discussing every public letter it receives.

Instead, the board opted to submit questions in writing to Skorkowsky as an initial step. The superintendent told trustees he was crafting a response letter, which would be emailed to them first.

The promised email — 1,193 words in length — arrived Wednesday evening.

It began: “I would like to take a moment to clarify a few items that have been discussed in the public arena lately — and issue you an apology.”

Skorkowsky proceeded to clarify that the district does not plan to include teachers in its reduction in force and hopes to minimize eliminations of support staff and administrators as well. He also pointed out that the district is surveying the community for input on potential budget reductions and is undergoing its yearly independent audit.

As for the budget shortfall, the superintendent reiterated that it’s related to a combination of rising costs, unfunded mandates and a state funding formula that hasn’t increased enough to keep pace with expenses.

“I take responsibility for not seeing the confluence of events and the severity of this crisis until July 2017,” he wrote in the email. “I apologize to you and to our community for that. However, even if we had known about this series of events earlier, we still would have had to reduce costs in the 2017-2018 budget.”

Skorkowsky ended his note calling on the unions to work with him and the trustees to solve this financial crisis and prevent it from happening again, adding that he’s “losing sleep” over the situation and worried about how it will affect employees and students.

The board is expected to discuss the budget and additional cuts at its next meeting, Sept. 14. The district has been sending robocalls to community members, encouraging them to participate in the survey about budget cuts.