New Business
A. Discussion and Possible Approval of an MGEA Collective Bargaining Agreement for 2009-2011
The district is currently operating under the terms of the last contract which expired in 2009, the new contract has been in negotiations for nearly 2 years. A new contract would extend only through June 30th of this year - but it would provide staff and the board a little bit of continuity that will allow us to continue to operate while the budget mess is sorted out.
Update: After a 2 hour discussion the Board unanimously approved a contract with the MGEA. The MGEA will meet this evening for a ratification vote, I will comment more about the contract and negotiations but only after they are concluded. So please withhold judgement!
18 comments:
This is clearly an end around on the tax payers and voters. Won't this agreement, if approved, limit your flexibility in budgeting once your state funding is dropped? Wasn't 2 years long enough to compromise and come to an agreement?
Please don't handcuff the district. Leave the contract open, prepare the layoff notices and truly bargain with our teachers on a level playing field.
If this contract is approved our youngest, best & brightest teachers will be laid off.
Unless the contract the teachers accept includes a 10% pay cut and significant increases in contributions to health care and pensions.
This is disgusting. We will remember your actions con Sunday come election day.
To the above poster. READ Peter's post! This contract is for THIS year and last year. It is not for next year. The money for this year and last year isn't going to be cut. The budget despair bill doesn't cut aid to schools in the current biennium.
Hmmmm. Then why must the board hurry into special session tomorrow?
If they have been working under terms of the old contract for 20 months, why the need to sign a contract with only four months left until the next contract is due? Just let them continue to work under the last contract. School is almost over for the year.
Seems fishy to me. And all done behind closed doors. Why can't the public be there to monitor these desperate measures?
So I ask Peter - Why now, all of a sudden, do you need to sign a contract 20 months late? Please explain for us.
The voter of Monona and Cottage Grove voted 2:1 against the Bozo in the Governor's mansion - and he didn't carry ANY of the municipalities. Peter should represent them, not the tea party nuts and the Koch brothers that elected Walker.
I have a duty to enable the district to discharge its affairs in an orderly fashion. The district-employee relationship is governed by a contract AND complex state law that have evolved together, and are dependent on each other. I would be happy to let the district continue to operate under the old contract temporarily, but the misnamed "budget repair bill" doesn't allow that. Instead it creates chaos by jerking out our current operating contract while leaving related state statutes in place. One example relates layoff notices - without the budget (that hasn't even been introduced yet) we can't plan for next year, but we have to issue layoff notices on Monday under state law. Our contract gives more flexibility, but as noted that would evaporate. Another issue relates to retirement - dozens of teachers in the district could potentially retire - something we can't afford financially or educationally. In the current situation, good dedicated teachers are forced to make this decision without any knowledge about the conditions of employment or law they will be operating under.
Why all of a sudden? Because the "budget repair bill" was introduced all of sudden on Feb. 11, without any apparent thought to the disruption it would cause and without giving local government units the time to consider and adapt to its provisions in an orderly fashion.
School districts need stability in order to operate and plan. Competent leadership manages change while minimizing disruption and providing transitional stability. This budget repair bill doesn't do that and forces us into emergency meetings to deal with the chaos.
We really are a nation of ignorance aren't we? And of course the great irony is how low education seems to be among the priorities of the nuts in the statehouse. Thank you for continuing to battle Peter.
"This budget repair bill doesn't do that and forces us into emergency meetings to deal with the chaos."
But we are OPEN FOR BUSINESS.
I think your thinking is correct-but don't you just want to say to the teacher's union: Our deal was not that bad now was it?
Of course that would not help
If the contract is not approved many of our most experienced, best and brightest will retire. These are teachers will irreplaceable skills.
Not to mention that they started when teaching was a valued profession and so are far higher quality than those entering the education field today. The best and brightest today go into finance where they know their salaries will be subsidized by taxpayer bailouts.
"This is clearly an end around on the tax payers and voters. Won't this agreement, if approved, limit your flexibility in budgeting once your state funding is dropped? Wasn't 2 years long enough to compromise and come to an agreement?
Please don't handcuff the district. Leave the contract open, prepare the layoff notices and truly bargain with our teachers on a level playing field.
If this contract is approved our youngest, best & brightest teachers will be laid off.
Unless the contract the teachers accept includes a 10% pay cut and significant increases in contributions to health care and pensions.
This is disgusting. We will remember your actions con Sunday come election day."
Sounds a lot like Scott Walker
Just saw Walker on Meet the Press. I think he's a train wreck of a governor, but he had one valid point.
The unions are saying they have conceded to the increased pension/health insurance contributions, but the people saying this really don't have the authority to say it in many cases. Maybe Marty Beil can speak for his union, but Mary Bell of WEAC cannot speak for the local teacher unions. Has anyone heard anyone from the MG teacher's union (or any other teacher's union)) say they will accept these financial terms for the new contract that begins July 1, 2011? I have not.
Because I will say this - if I have been out protesting with a sign that says "it's not about the money," and these unions end up making me and tens of thousand of others looks like fools, well, that's going to be a BIG PROBLEM.
You are right that the contracts are negotiated with the individual bargaining units - but the provisions on compensation would be a requirement of state law, not a subject of negotiation. All of the compromise legislation includes these clauses - so it wouldn't be up to the unions. Mary Bell's statement was essentially that WEAC wouldn't oppose legislation on the grounds of those provisions.
After this bill is passed, there will be no contracts like this ever again. If the MGSD wants to balance their budget they should layoff the older, higher paid teachers. Keep the younger, best and brighest. They won't cost as much.
In this case, the financial decisions of this district, and many others, WILL be about the money. You want more teachers? Then keep the new ones and fire the old ones. This is how you run a government like a corporation, isn't it?
Exactly how many of the "best and brightest" will go into teaching when they know they will get laid off when their compensation becomes inconviently large.
Maybe its finally time for this school district to approach the Madison Metropolitan School District about merging.
Small school districts are top-heavy in administration and have unusually high overhead costs. I'm sure a merged district could fill Nichols and Maywood. When the high school fills (or is it already?), some of the over flow can go to LaFollette or East.
"Consolidation" will be the magic word for the next few years.
I don't think people want to join the Madison School District. Over the last few years, you've had about 200 kids try to get into Monona from Madison, and only about 20 go the other way.
400+ school districts is a lot of redundant overhead.
School districts should consolidate to at least a county level. There are way too many over-paid administrators and too many school boards.
Let's make governing more efficient through economies of scale.
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