BCSD Teacher Contracts Up For Renewal: Need Our Awareness And Input
To the Editor:
Why is it that the Berlin School Board and the Eastwick Press, although being most aggressive in communicating to the public about relatively peripheral Berlin School District issues like lead paint and the periodic Kabuki dance over the school budget votes, why is it that they utterly fail to communicate with the voters about the one issue that vastly more significantly affects the taxes we pay, namely the impending contract negotiations with the Berlin Teachers Association?
I quote from an email I received the other day from BSD Interim Superintendent Dr. Brian Howard; “the current Collective Bargaining Agreement (the contract) with the Berlin Teachers Associations expires on July 1, 2011. Formal negotiations will begin soon. All terms and conditions in the contract, including salaries and benefits, are negotiable. Current laws and regulations require that the conditions in the current contract be maintained until a mutually agreed upon contract is approved by the Berlin Teachers Association and the BCSD Board of Education.”
How many times have we received BCSD school budget voter informational statements with a prominent caveat embedded saying that although we can vote on garage roofs, bus repairs, school supplies, etc., the vast amount of the school budget can not be touched by the voters because it deals with teacher/staff salaries and benefits, which are already frozen in stone by prior negotiations?
Well, now is the time for the voters to stand up and be counted where it really matters, not by voting, but by contacting our school board members. These “prior” negotiations are about to begin now.
I have in my possession two recent successive years of the Albany Times-Union “Report Card on the Schools.” Among the highly informative data stands one stark comparison that should give all BCSD residents pause. In comparing the median teacher salaries between all districts in Rensselaer County, ONLY TROY HAD A HIGHER MEDIAN TEACHER SALARY THAN THE BERLIN BCSD. And similarly, ONLY TROY HAD A HIGHER PER PUPIL COST THAN THE BCSD. At the very least, the BCSD and the Eastwick Press should inform the readers and voters why this is so. I will be glad to make these pages available to anyone wishing them. Just email me at mclmix@cisbec.net.
Do we want another several years of those BCSD flyers promoting the latest school budget vote but with that unfortunate caveat saying that most of the budget is out of the voters’ hands? We deserve more than that.
My most important point and plea is that the BCSD had a duty to keep the voters informed of this most important aspect of their citizen participation in the education of their children and the taxes they pay. I do not ever remember receiving a BCSD mailer informing voters of the teachers contract options up for negotiation and its progress. It’s about time that changed. For starters, it would be good to know when negotiations start, what the current teacher package (especially benefits and pensions) entails, what the percentage of inflation expectations is written into the contract, etc.
And equally as important, I do not ever remember the Eastwick Press printing one word about this issue, notwithstanding their otherwise excellent and welcome coverage of the BCSD school board. I expect that is because the BCSD tries to keep these negotiations under wraps and out of the light of day until they are finished. Good for the board’s peace of mind. Bad for the taxpayers of the BCSD.
Isn’t it a duty of the press to pry and cajole and ferret out and present these issues to its readers, who have such a huge stake in their outcome? Let’s see the Eastwick Press live up to the task, as I know it can. The Feb. 11 issue made a good start with touching on the implications of the new state budget on local school issues. But as for the other issues I mentioned, the voters of the district and the Eastwick Press readers deserve to not be held in the dark.
Barton McLean
Petersburgh, NY
Editor’s Response: Mr. McLean is right to point out that the upcoming teachers’ contract negotiations are of immense importance to the taxpayers of the District and that the taxpayers should express their concerns to their elected School Board members who are looking out after their constituents’ interests and to the school administration. The District did not fare well in the last contract negotiation as one can infer from the Times-Union articles to which McLean refers (this is old news by the way!).
However, I do object to McLean’s characterizing this newspaper as a creature of the School District that is somehow colluding with the District to keep information from the public. Nothing could be farther from the truth – as most of our readers, the School Board and the School Administration will attest. And most of our readers don’t think that lead abatement at BES or the closing of the Stephentown and Grafton schools or the school budget are “peripheral issues.” These issues affect the safety of their children, the quality of their children’s education and everyone’s taxes.
Specifically regarding the upcoming negotiations – we are reporters not clairvoyants; when the contract negotiations begin we will do our best to report on them. To say the Teachers’ Union and the School District want to keep this under wraps is an understatement. We are not privy to the negotiations, we are not given access and, in the past, we were not provided with documents when we asked for them. Perhaps this time a School Board member or a union delegate will break their vow of silence and speak to us about it. Don’t hold your breath. Perhaps McLean can “ferret out” some information. We’d be glad to publish it. In the meantime, don’t crab at us – just say you’d like us to cover it, and we’ll try our best.