The Bethlehem Central Teachers Association Union is in talks with school officials about the possibility of renegotiating its contact in the face of a financial meltdown that could threaten job security.
Bethlehem Superintendent Michael Tebbano told residents about the contract talks during the district’s final public budget meeting on Monday, Feb. 9. He said the teachers were willing to have union representatives re-open their current contract with the district.
Tebbano said he couldn’t specify the nature of the talks because he is sworn to confidentiality, but considering the magnitude of the district’s financial dilemma, the district doesn’t appear to be looking for salary increases or raises, but would likely be looking for reductions.
`If we didn’t do any reductions, the tax levy would be too high for this community to support,` said Tebbano at the budget meeting. `We’re not alone in this situation.`
He also took a moment to commend the teachers for coming back to the table.
`This is monumental for our school district for the teachers to be willing to do this,` Tebbano said. `They realize the bigger picture, and I applaud them for that.`
However, Tebbano warned, just because discussions with the teacher’s union have opened up, it does not mean any contractual changes with the teachers will occur.
`There is no guarantee that this will go anywhere,` he said, `but it’s a start.`
The current BCTA contract with the district calls for an average of a 3.23 percent salary increase until 2010 with a `step increase` for each position, which translates into a more than 5 percent salary increase.
Tebbano hasn’t publicly announced any reduction in teaching staff but has repeatedly warned, referring to the upcoming school budget, that the district is going to be facing many `difficult decisions.` The superintendent also said Bethlehem is looking for any cost-saving measures it can find, including not replacing certain staffers, such as the soon-to-retire Elsmere Elementary librarian.
The president of BCTA, David Rounds, said the school approached the teachers about opening up the contracts.
`The board of education approached the union and the union agreed to discuss possible changes to the current contract,` said Rounds. `The BCTA teachers association agreed to discuss possible changes to the final year of our current contract to try to see if there were ways to save the district money next year, while at the same time maintaining the integrity of the teachers contract.`
According to the BCTA Constitution, Rounds said two-thirds of the membership would have to approve the changes before they could go into effect and change an existing contract.
With 465 employees covered by the teacher’s contract, the district’s budget increases each year by hundreds of thousands of dollars just to cover the pay raises. There are two other union contracts with the district: the Bethlehem Central United Employees (BCUE) Association and Bethlehem Principals Association (BPA).
The BCUE covers 509 employees, such as maintenance workers and other essential staff and the BPA covers the district’s 16 principals and administrators who typically collect the highest salaries.
One resident at the Monday, Feb. 9, public budget hearing asked if the administrators union is also in talks about renegotiating its contract.
Tebbano said he wouldn’t speculate on if the BPA would begin talks, saying, `The district can only negotiate with one union at a time.`
He added that the district would have to `wait and see` how the discussions went before it could move on to another contract.
Tebbano added that Bethlehem, as far as he knew, was the only school district re-opening a union contract and certainly the only district in the Suburban Council to do so.
Still, the district must not only cut back on spending, it needs to look for new revenue sources, according to the school’s chief financial officer, Judi Kehoe. She told residents the current projects show a total increase of $5.2 million in expenditures if spending continued at its current level.
`That’s if we change nothing of how we spend currently. We need to get the current year balanced and take a conservative view and really take a long-term look,` Kehoe said. `We’re looking at other revenue sources but we also have to some work on expenditures.`
Kehoe said taxes would not be enough to fill the budget gap.
If the district didn’t look for new revenue and cut spending, Tebbano said the community would be looking at what he deemed `the scary numbers.`
`You’d be looking at a 10 percent tax levy increase,` he said, `and this is not reality, so that is not a solution.`
Board of Education President James Lytle said some new revenue suggestions have included creating an alumni endowment fund where former students could donate money to keep certain programs afloat and even renting space for a cell phone tower on school property.
`Ultimately there are no bad ideas,` he said, `but we’re going to have to make some very tough decisions.`
Tebbano said the school must do what it can in the face of potentially millions of dollars of lost state aid, and there’s no guarantee what the federal or state government will be able to do for the school. The superintendent said he has heard from local legislators that government funding for education is going to target more inner city districts, with less for the more `affluent districts.`
`There’s such an injustice here on what people think school districts can afford,` Tebbano said. `I have to jump through a lot of hoops with the state to get our hands on the money.`
Tebbano will present his reduction budget plan at the next school board meeting on Wednesday, Feb. 25, which starts at 7 p.m. at the school’s district offices, 90 Adams Place, Delmar.
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