The board of trustees of MPUSD is scheduled to negotiate with the superintendent and her cabinet during tonight's board meeting. Members of the Monterey Bay Teachers Association are upset because they say the administrators are in line for a big pay raise.
Not so, says board president Diane Creasey in a letter to the district community. There won't be salary raises. Rather, there may be some changes (Creasey's a bit circumspect on this) because administrators were originally hired to work 222 days out of the year and now, with so many positions having been eliminated, now work 230 days out of the year. They're working hard to keep the district running, she says in not so few words. And no, Measure P funds won't be used, she says.
Here's the letter in its entirety.
In keeping with the Board’s commitment to remain transparent, I would like to provide the rationale for the negotiated contract changes with the Superintendent and Cabinet level administrators that will appear on the Board agenda this Monday, April 18.
The Superintendent’s contracted salary that the Board will be taking action on will not result in an increased cost to the District’s budget. Last year, the Superintendent’s salary was adjusted to include $8300 in health and welfare benefits which is the same for all MPUSD employees. With this change, the Superintendent became personally responsible for paying her own health and welfare benefits. Health and welfare costs, along with other expenses that were listed separately from the Superintendent’s base salary in years past, are now included in the base salary.
An additional change to the Superintendent’s contract is an increase to the number of contracted work days from 222 to 230 days. Since 2007, the Superintendent has been working an average of 8 additional days per year and as per the contract has been paid for these additional days at the end of each fiscal year. The Superintendent has served as the Chief Business Official (CBO) since the position was eliminated last year. This same scenario is also true of the Cabinet level administrators. As administrative staff continues to be reduced in order to keep reductions away from the classroom, job duties and requirements must be assumed by remaining administrative staff members. The current contract requires payment for these additional days at the end of each fiscal year. These additional days are now being included as normal workdays in the new contract agreement. Cabinet level administrators will now be expected to work 230 days as part of their normally contracted work year.
The practice of compensating employees for additional hours and work days is applied at all levels in MPUSD. This year, MPUSD budgeted $1,375,776 and has currently paid $943,135 to employees for participating in professional development and additional work agreements. The District also uses categorical grant funds to provide extra and co-curricular stipends, summer school, and extended learning work wages to employees. MPUSD will also be providing teachers with one additional day of compensation by returning the teacher work year to 184 days for the 2011-2012 school year.
MPUSD is in the fortunate position to not have to impose furlough days, salary reductions, or a freeze in step or column for any employee. Additionally, the District offered, and bargaining units have accepted, an increased $400,000 District contribution through the 2011-2012 school year for Dental insurance premium coverage. As a result, our employees will not face an increase cost for dental insurance. These positive outcomes that ensure fiscal solvency and security for MPUSD employees are the direct result of sound business practices and strong leadership.
The Board has worked with the Superintendent to create equity and stability at all levels of our District. As part of this effort, a salary schedule for Cabinet level administrators has been developed that mirrors the same advancement in steps as other administrators and management staff, salary increments up to six steps. To date, the Superintendent and Cabinet administrators are the only MPUSD employees that do not receive an annual step increase. MBTA, CSEA, and Confidential eligible employees are all entitled to annual step movements. The budgeted step and column for certificated employees for 2011-2012 is over $1.1 million with the classified and management step increases budgeted at $400,000.
To provide clarification regarding the use of Measure P funds to pay for salaries, Measure P bond funds cannot be used for staff salaries unless their work is directly related to the projects funded from the bond. The Director of Facilities position, John Silvestrini, which involves the development and implementation of bond projects, is an appropriate use of these funds. The passage of Measure P has relieved the District of debt which has saved over $750,000 in annual payments. In addition, there have been other savings that have enabled MPUSD to have a positive budget, such as reductions of District level positions, increased budget oversight and the building of the District’s capacity to be self-sufficient and less reliant on outsourcing of services.
The Administration will continue its efforts to reduce expenditures to non-public agencies for services such as Speech and Language Specialists by working with MBTA to establish a competitive salary schedule to attract and retain employees in this field, as well as continuing to return programs currently being served by the Monterey County Office of Education. While much has been accomplished there are areas that still need to be improved upon to help us through these challenging times.
The Board of Trustees recognizes the impact of receiving a preliminary layoff notice. Therefore, MPUSD was proactive in offering a fiscal incentive to teachers for early retirement notification to avoid the issuance of unnecessary layoff notices to teachers. As a result, MPUSD did not issue layoff notices to teachers this past March which is an unprecedented accomplishment for a school district in these challenging economic times.
I, along with my fellow Board Members, recognize that some of the decisions that are made may not fully be understood by the District stakeholders. The Board of Trustees is committed to transparency of our actions and we will continue to communicate with you directly on anything that may cause you, our employees, concern.
Sincerely,
Diane Creasey
MPUSD Board President
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