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Schools

No cheers on teachers' raises

A deal for this school year, if ratified, will bring a retroactive $800 increase, but Hernando still ranks lower than any county in the area.

By ABHI RAGHUNATHAN
Published December 9, 2005

BROOKSVILLE - In a drab room filled with slumped shoulders and muted voices, union officials and school district negotiators agreed on a new contract Thursday that accepts the reality of a tight budget for teacher salaries.

The agreement for this school year, if ratified, will give all teachers a retroactive $800 raise and more than double the supplemental money given to speech and language pathologists. And under the deal, teachers with 11 years of experience or more in Hernando will get an annual longevity payment ranging from $261.35 to $609.81, beginning in January.

Starting next school year, the longevity pay increase will be extended to teachers with six years or more of experience in Hernando. And teachers who obtain advanced degrees will get from $200 to $600 more next school year. All the pay raises come in addition to the average 2.5 percent step increase for experience that teachers have received.

As they agreed on the details, both sides declared that their hands were tied by the school district's financial situation. They said there wasn't enough money to give teachers the raises they deserve.

The proposal will be presented to the teachers union and the School Board in January. Teachers and the board must vote on the contract.

After being bombarded with hundreds of angry e-mails, both sides abandoned another idea they discussed during negotiations Tuesday: not making raises retroactive to the start of the school year. Teachers union officials said there was no way an agreement that even considered such a possibility could be approved.

"My teachers have said they're not happy," said Brian Phillips, Hernando Classroom Teachers Association president. "They don't trust the district, and they don't trust the School Board."

To emphasize his point, Phillips read from a stack of e-mails. Teachers criticized the union, called the idea of not making raises retroactive nonsense and mused about why they should have to pay for administrative mistakes such as the district's ongoing legal fight with former Powell Middle School principal Michael Ransaw.

The agreement does make headway on a few goals both sides said needed work when they first began negotiations. For example, it increases the incentives for pathologists and experienced teachers to stay in Hernando County.

But the agreement does little to improve how the county stacks up against other Florida school districts when it comes to teacher pay. The average salary for a Hernando teacher in 2004-05 was $36,177: about $5,400 less than the state average and 60th among the state's 67 school districts. Every neighboring county in the area ranked far higher than Hernando.

Many teachers were upset that their union representatives made a key concession during Tuesday's negotiation session. On that day, the union decided to agree that only $60.7-million was available for teacher salaries this year, enough for an average 4 percent raise.

The anger among teachers "was the worst that I've ever seen anywhere," Eastside Elementary School teacher Dan Beeman said. Teachers were fed up that the district hadn't budged from its offer and "wanted to make a statement," he said.

But union officials said they didn't have much choice other than accepting the district's offer. They had declared one impasse in October and feared that a mediator could hand down contract terms that would be even less favorable for teachers if they continued to hold out.

District officials wanted to wrap up negotiations, which have gone on for months. Parrott Middle School principal Marvin Gordon said his teachers "wanted closure." And Barbara Kidder, the district's director of labor relations and professional standards, urged those negotiating to take a realistic approach.

"If it (the agreement) is not ratifiable by them (the union), we're wasting our time," she said.

Abhi Raghunathan can be reached at araghunathan@sptimes.com or 352 848-1431.

[Last modified December 9, 2005, 01:19:17]