Monday, September 28th, 2015
Celina board, teachers far apart on pay
CEA alleges board's disclosure of salary proposals is illegal
By Claire Giesige
CELINA - As mediation efforts continue, the board of education and the Celina Education Association appear to remain far apart on salary issues.
On Friday, the board of education posted the most recent proposals from the CEA and the board on the district website.
Both proposals include teacher salary schedules with step increases. Teachers have received only one step increase in the previous four years, according to CEA co-presidents Dave Scott and Mark Loughridge.
The CEA is asking for a base salary of $34,000 for the 2015-2016 school year. The board is offering a base salary of $33,512. The district's current base salary is $32,536.
In the CEA proposal for 2015-2016, teachers with a bachelor's degree at step zero would be paid $34,000; a bachelor's degree at step 10, $49,640; a master's degree at step zero, $38,420; and a master's degree at step 10, $55,760.
The board's proposal offers teachers with a bachelor's degree at step zero $33,512, bachelor's degree at step 10, $48,928; master's degree at step zero, $37,869; and master's degree at step 10, $54,960.
Other Mercer County schools, Parkway, Marion Local, Fort Recovery, St. Henry and Coldwater, offer average salaries of $34,628 to teachers with a bachelor's degree at step zero, $48,359 for a bachelor's degree at step 10, $38,244 for a master's degree at step zero and $54,631 for a master's degree at step 10, according to numbers on the State Employment Relations Board website.
The lowest base salary in the county is $33,310 at Marion Local and the highest is $37,340 at Coldwater.
Western Buckeye League schools, Bath, Defiance, Elida, Kenton, Ottawa-Glandorf, Shawnee, St. Marys, Van Wert and Wapakoneta, offer on average $34,241 to teachers with a bachelor's degree at step zero; $47,746 for a bachelor's degree at step 10; $37,843 for a master's degree at step zero; and $54,741 for a master's degree at step 10.
St. Marys' base salary is $35,100.
In addition to the contract proposals, the board also posted a prepared statement on the district website.
"The Celina Board of Education has a goal of giving its teachers the largest salary increase possible without financially straining the District. The proposal put forward by the Celina Education Association would force the District to deficit spend in the second year of the proposed contract forcing the District to utilize funds in the cash balance reserve. Once the District begins using cash reserve funds to pay for permanent expenses (such as salaries and fringe benefits), the cash reserve balance will need to be used each year to cover expenses. This would cause the reserve balance to be depleted within five years. Before that time, difficult decisions would have to be made including asking the tax payers of the District for more operating money, cutting programs, cutting staff or a combination of all of these," the statement read.
The board included a chart comparing the individual base salary increases that teachers would receive under both the CEA and board proposals.
"Under the CEA proposal the range of increases over the two- year contract would be from 8.68 percent to 27.8 percent with an average increase of 16.49 percent. Under the BOE proposal the range would be from 6.09 percent to 15.42 percent with an average increase of 10.69 percent," the board's message said.
The CEA is also asking for one step to be restored in 2015-2016 to all members affected by the freeze and an additional step in 2016-2017. The board's proposal does not restore those steps. However, both sides agree that step advancement should be resumed.
The CEA released a statement on Saturday calling the school board's release of the proposals a violation of Ohio law.
"The Celina Education Association is deeply disappointed that the Celina Board of Education has chosen to violate Ohio law and publish misleading information on the school district's website," CEA spokesperson Steve Stewart stated in the release. "Because CEA is following the law, we will not respond to the information posted on the website at this time. Celina teachers will continue to direct our focus on the education and well-being of the students of Celina City Schools and leave negotiations to our bargaining team."
Board spokesperson Matt Gilmore told the newspaper the board's action did not violate the law.
Board members chose to post the proposals to clear up any misunderstanding while negotiations continue, he added.
"There was misinformation going around. I'd stop short of calling it a campaign but there was a lot of misinformation out there" Gilmore said. "The community and taxpayers were being asked to support a fair contract without any details of whose concept of a fair contract it was. They were being asked to hang all these signs in support of teachers without any context of that. We decided to put it out there and let the public make up its own mind."
The base salary for Coldwater Exempted Village Schools teachers was reported incorrectly. The correct figure is $34,257. The error was made in reporting.
