Placing Salaries in the School Budget Pot

One of the foremost items which should be included in the preliminary Bridgewater-Raritan 2011-2012 School Budget now being prepared is a provision for the salaries of principals, supervisors, teachers and other employees. 

Last summer on July 1^th, 2010, the current three-year contract with the Bridgewater-Raritan Education Association entered its third and final year with an annual increase of 4.35%.

That contract included a three-year compound increase of slightly over 13% for teachers.  A new multi-year contract needs to be negotiated to take effect on July 1, 2011. (Similarly, new contracts for the principals and supervisors also have to be negotiated.)

Whether or not that dialogue has begun, the budget now being prepared for 2011-2012 should contain at least an estimated number for projected salaries, obviously including any tentative pay increase for the next school year(s).  (Or no increase, if that is the strategy.) 

Disclosing the details of such a budget would signal to the community whether or not the B-R Board of Education will adopt a pliable stance, or whether it will resolve to approach negotiations with the three major unions armed with the economic realities of our times.

 

If prior practice holds, the public will not know what the board’s position is towards employee unions.

The argument against disclosure is the usual one:  Contract negotiations must be held behind closed doors and negotiated in secret:  Hence no line item detail in the preliminary budget because that would reveal what the salary target is. 

The B-R BOE needs to grasp the bull by the horns; include a zero-increase salary number in the preliminary budget and begin to negotiate its contracts with the three associations accordingly.

Bridgewater and Raritan taxpayers can no longer afford union/school board contract negotiation practices which were employed in bygone salad days.  That approach left the public in the dark about what was being discussed and when it was being discussed.

Two significant issues are at stake:  1. the board’s decision on salary levels, and 2. making that decision known in advance so that the entire Bridgewater-Raritan community can make its views known and exert its influence.