 |
||||||||
 |
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
School Board to examine pay issues
By BARBARA BEHRENDT, Times Staff Writer INVERNESS -- Hit hard last year by state budget cuts after the September terrorist attacks, school officials have painted a cautious image of what the coming budget year might hold. The School Board will take up several financial issues Tuesday, including salary increases for select administrators and nonunion support workers and payment for another round of consultant services from Susan Leddick. Pay raise discussions ran late for all employees last year as the district tried to sort out the financial hit taken when state revenues dropped after Sept. 11. The final contracts with unions weren't settled until the very end of the past fiscal year. Negotiations with employees for pay raises for the 2002-03 year have not yet started with the unions representing the three organized employee groups. But some nonunion workers will see increases soon if the School Board accepts two proposals on Tuesday. During the past fiscal year, officials created a priority list of actions to fix inequities in the salary structure of administrators. Since funds were limited, only the top couple of items could be accomplished. Among them: giving all administrators raises while providing especially big increases to the assistant superintendent and high school principals. Those positions' salaries were most out of line compared to others in the state. Another priority identified but not funded last year was a pay supplement to administrators who had earned advanced degrees. On Tuesday, superintendent David Hickey will propose that, retroactive to July 1, administrators with specialist degrees earn an additional $3,000 and those with doctorates receive an extra $4,000. All totaled, the pay supplements would cost the district $34,000. Teachers have earned extra money for master's, specialist or doctoral degrees for years. Now, for the first time, administrators also would receive additional pay if they have advanced degrees. The board also will be asked to approve $17,400 to provide hourly raises of 15 cents per hour for the support workers who are not union members. Those are primarily secretaries and clerks who work for top administrators and are considered by the state to be a different class of employees from other clerks, aides and secretaries represented by the Citrus County Education Association. Pay raises for administrators and nonunion workers usually do not come to the board until after the employee unions settle. But these pay increases are not typical raise packages, according to Mary Curry, the district's executive director for management services. The supplements for advanced degrees have already been discussed by the board; if not for fiscal constraints, the pay boosts already would be in place, Curry said. The other pay increases for nonunion workers are needed to make their salaries equitable with what was negotiated for union support staff who received increases of 30 cents per hour at the end of the past year. Those increases were designed to even out a previous inequity in the pay scale. Regular pay raises for the nonunion workers and administrators will come at the usual time this year: at the same time or shortly after when the unions settle, Curry said. Also on Tuesday's agenda is a request to approve $26,700 for Leddick's consulting company, Profound Knowledge Resources. School Board members already have questioned whether Leddick's services are still needed. She first came to Citrus County in 1997. Since then, her work in strategic planning and a program called "Data Not Guesswork" have reportedly cost the district nearly $180,000. That includes $12,000 to send Citrus educators to Montana several years ago for training. At a recent School Board meeting, board members questioned whether it was time to handle training and strategic planning in-house rather than continuing to bring Leddick to the county several times a year. Officials have defended the need to continue to use Leddick's services. Hickey said he would like to see her continue her work, especially since more strategic planning work is needed with support departments such as food service and transportation.
 © 2006 • All Rights Reserved • Tampa Bay Times
490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 
|
|
