School staff re-negotiates pay hike

The Franklin County School Board on Thursday, Dec. 17 unanimously approved changes to its existing three-year contract with teachers and staff that will slice by more than half the pay increase originally agreed to for this year and next.

By a 4-0 vote, with Board Member David Hinton absent, the school board on Dec. 17 approved a two-year contract revision that means employees will receive a 3 percent raise this school year, retroactive to July 1 and running through June 30, 2010. This pay hike will be applied to each of the steps that teachers advance along based on additional experience and education.

For the next fiscal year, running from July 1, 2010 through June 30, 2011, the steps along the pay scale will remain the same, but each staffer will get a bonus equivalent to 3 percent of their salary, with a minimum bonus of $500. This minimum will benefit those paraprofessionals and non-teaching staffers who make less than about $16,500 per year.

In addition, the revised contract calls for the implementation next semester of an experimental program in which teachers will be paid, at their regular hourly rate, for an additional 30 minutes of work each day.

This time period, which will run from 2:45 to 3:15 p.m. Monday through Friday, is intended to be used for such tasks as tutoring students, professional development training, instructional planning, data collection and assessing student papers.

On Dec. 14, members of the Franklin County Education Association voted overwhelmingly to approve the deal, with 97 percent in favor, said Cathy Wood, union representative.

While these back-to-back pay increases for teachers are among the best found in any county throughout the state, the deal actually represents a decrease in the pay hikes originally slated for years two and three of a three-year contract approved in 2008.

The original contract followed in the wake of county voters’ approval in June 2008 of a four-year, half-mill tax levy, earmarked for salaries and benefits.

The first year of the contract, running from July 1, 2008 through June 20, 2009, granted employees a 10 percent pay hike, and would have extended them an 8 percent increase this year, and 6 percent next year, had it not been renegotiated.

The administration had called for renegotiating after plummeting property values indicated the half-mill levy would yield only about $1.28 million this year, a good half-million dollars below the $1.73 million it brought in one year ago. Prior to approval by voters, estimates were the four-year levy would yield between $1.5 million and $1.8 million each year until it expires June 30, 2012.

“All the forecasts from the Department of Education, Property Appraiser Doris Pendleton’s office, the superintendents’ association, all of those forecasts predict that next year and possibly following that, property values and assessments will continue to go down,” said Wood.

She said the union leadership decided to renegotiate pay hikes rather than take a hard line to enforce the existing contract language.

“The logic was that we had a contract and if the county honored that contract they would probably have to file financial distress with the Department of Education,” Wood said. “Why would we ever want to do to our administration? We had to work with them.”

Wood said teachers asked for a 4 percent raise this year and next, but were told by Sam Carnley, the district’s director of financial services, the district couldn’t afford it. The school countered with an offer of a 3 percent bonus for each of the two years. In addition to not raising the salary steps, a bonus does apply to a teacher’s retirement earnings.

Wood said the union rejected the back-to-back bonuses. “We said we couldn’t do that for our members,” she said.

She said that by agreeing to the two-year deal, the union “locked in a contract at the very best rate the county would agree to. It’s one of the best agreements in the state of Florida.”

Mark Pudlow, a spokesman for the Florida Education Association, said that about half of the 67 school districts in the state have settled contracts for the current school year.

“A 3 percent hike is as high as I've heard this year,” he said, noting that contract settlements have ranged from a pay cut, with no raises and a greater health insurance contribution by employees, to the district picking up health insurance, step increases, and a small salary increase.

Wood praised the leadership of Superintendent Nina Marks and School Board Chairman Jimmy Gander for nailing down the new contract.

“Nina cares about us,” said Wood. “She’s been a teacher in Franklin County for over 20 years and she cares about her staff. And Jimmy Gander has stood by his word at every board meeting I’ve been present at, that if we pass the referendum, it will be for salary and benefits for employees.

“I couldn’t be more pleased with the camaraderie between the union and the administration,” she said.

Health insurance rates climb by 10.5 %

At the Dec. 17 meeting, the school board also agreed to a new schedule of health insurance premiums from their carrier, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Florida, which will raise rates by 10.5 percent, effective Feb. 1, 2010.

The new rate schedule will mean coverage for a single individual plan will cost $774.28 per month, up from $700.78 this year. The school board pays for this coverage in its entirety, or about $9,291 per each fulltime employee who enrolls in the plan.

The monthly cost of family coverage will rise from the current $1,102.29 per month to $1,217.90 beginning Feb. 1. Employees who elect this family coverage must pay out of their own pockets the difference between it and single coverage, or about $443 per month.

In his letter to the school board explaining the premium increases, James Spivey, benefit representative with Blue Cross, said the increase was based on the school district’s claims history from July 2008 through June 2009, which amounted to more than $1.1 million in paid claims, including two claims in excess of $100,000.

Statistics provided by Spivey indicated that for the top 10 medical conditions covered, employees of the school district covered by the insurance plan had double, and in some cases triple, the incidence of illness and disease than in comparable mid-size groups.

Nearly 25 percent of school district employees covered by the plan had hypertension, more than double the 10.8 percent found in all mid-size groups.

Congestive heart failure occurred in 12.5 percent of the school district’s insured, nearly triple the 4.2 percent incidence rate in all mid-size groups. Diabetes was diagnosed for nearly 14 percent of the school system’s insured, more than three times the average of 4.1 percent among all mid size groups.

Coronary artery disease was present in 6.8 percent of the district’s insured, compared to 4.1 percent of all mid-size groups. Asthma was diagnosed in 9.3 percent of the system’s insured, compared to 5.9 percent across all mid-size groups.

Among the school district’s insured, the incidence rate of Parkinson’s disease, chronic renal failure, cancer, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and cystic fibrosis all exceeded the rate for all mid-size groups.

In an effort to move some of the older individuals out of the insured pool, and thus slow down the annual premium rate increases, the school district agreed to institute a Medicare supplemental coverage plan that will cost retirees anywhere from $196 to $272 per month, depending on the age in which they start the plan.

Even with the additional $210 per month for pharmacy coverage, the monthly cost of the plan is lower than it costs a retiree to remain with the regular health insurance plan. School officials are hoping to convince retirees that the benefits are as good or better than the regular plan, and will save them money as well.