Pacific Grove Unified School
District
Note: This web page is a copy of the minutes from the Board of
Education Meeting.
Minutes are NOT OFFICIAL until approved by the Board.
The official Minutes are available at the Board Office.
Address any questions to the Superintendent, Dr. Ralph Porras, or call the District Office at 831-646-6510.
PACIFIC GROVE UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT
BOARD OF EDUCATION
Minutes of the Meeting of January 5, 2006 Special Board Meeting
The Board of Education of the Pacific Grove Unified School District held a meeting on January 5, 2006 at the District Office.
I. OPENED BUSINESS
A. Called to Order 7:15 p.m.
B. Roll Call Members Present: Richard Schramm
Bill Phillips
Beth Shammas
Mike Niccum (arrived 7:17 p.m.)
Members Absent: Jessie Bray
Administration Present: Patrick Perry
Robin Blakley
C. Pledge of Allegiance pledge recited
D. Adopted Agenda
MOTION (Schramm/Phillips) to adopt agenda
Public comment:
Susan Nine – PGTA co–president, addressed the Board regarding negotiations (transcript attached).
Motion CARRIED 3 – 0 to adopt agenda
E. Identified Closed Session Topics
Meeting with Chief Negotiator Patrick Perry regarding PGTA, CSEA and Confidential employees
F. Adjourned to Closed Session 7:35 p.m.
II. CLOSED SESSION
III. RECONVENED IN OPEN SESSION 9:40 p.m.
Report action taken in Closed Session
Meeting with Chief Negotiator Patrick Perry regarding PGTA, CSEA and Confidential employees
No action taken
IV. ADJOURNED 9:41 p.m.
Transcript of (Recorded) Public Comments, Board Meeting of January 5, 2006
Susan Nine
I was sent here by the membership to represent to you their thinking as regards to at least the monetary aspect of our contract settlement which seems to have been prolonged and sometimes difficult discussions. As I was saying, especially with our younger members of the union, have felt that we should not be using county districts for comparisons but should be broadening our comparisons with Basic Aids districts because of the very different funding that those districts have. For example, I believe our District receives about $5 million dollars more than it would if it were it a revenue–limit district, such as every other district in our current comparison group with the exception of Carmel.
But in the spirit of compromise, we have agreed to limit comparisons districts to those in our county so long as the goal was achieved to be in the top quartile relative to those districts. What we found when we compared ourselves to those districts was that, first, we are the only district in the group that is requiring a masters degree to assess the final column of the salary schedule. We believe this to be an important comparability issue that we expect to be remedied. Those other districts provide stipends for their teachers with advanced degrees. That is another issue we believe is comparability.
We found that we were significantly behind the goal with regards to health benefits. As you know, we are now paying out–of–pocket for our health benefits quite substantially. Whereas, we found that most of the other districts in our comparison group have automatic escalators in their contracts that guaranteed forward paid premiums regardless of negotiations. So, that’s another comparability issue. But, meanwhile, so long as during the protracted negotiations, we are paying out of pocket, and even if we increase the premiums for the employee at the Plan 1 rate, which we feel has become the only truly viable plan that MCSIG offers, in comparison, it shows that we would still be behind the other districts in our comparison group in regards to dependent coverage. that includes single dependent and full family. So that needs to be addressed to accomplish the agreed–upon goals.
We also found that we are behind the goal at the upper end of the salary schedule. A teacher teaching 30 years in this district, even with a masters or doctorate, right now the upper end is less than $80,000 a year. In comparison, in just comparing the salaries, we find that is far from the top quartile. So what we’ve been discussing is adding another step at the upper end. That particular part of the salary schedule is especially important in the long term as you know because it becomes the basis for most teachers’ retirement.
So those are the main catch–up items we’ve been looking at just to achieve comparability. We feel that once those are achieved, those things will stop being a cause of concern in securing those items into the future. But they are necessary to get us to the goals that I believe we’ve mutually agreed upon.
The other significant thing that we are looking at is something that all employees have to go with, which is the inflationary factor. Now, the State is basing its funding on the Consumer Price Index which is over 4%, and we feel that our salary schedule has to keep pace with inflation to prevent it from becoming a backward economy for the employees and the District. So, we are actually looking at less than the CPI to be applied to the salary schedule to address the inflationary factor. And we don’t consider that a raise; we consider that maintaining the current status quo. We believe that most, if not all employees, even if they have reached a goal – like let’s use Pat as an example. I know everyone picks on Pat and his great salary. But, just as an example, if we could establish that our Superintendent was first or second in the county, I seriously doubt whether an argument could be made that he should not receive inflationary cost of living adjustment from year to year.
Those are really the only items of any significance that are the monetary items we are looking at. And we believe they are all consistent with the mutually established goals of this year. We’ve also made significant downward movement in our expectations by allowing some of those items to be put off until next year so that budgeting can be done and so there would be less of an impact in one year, even though we feel that the District is experiencing a great windfall year with an unanticipated increase in property tax revenue of over 8%. We feel it is a year of opportunity to reach the goals that we have mutually agreed upon and we feel that in the future that will simplify negotiations because once some of those inequities are dealt with, then we are looking at more of a maintenance mode in regards to other districts.
We appreciate the careful consideration you are giving to the situation and we are looking forward to meeting with the district negotiator on the ominous day of Friday the 13th and we hope to have positive movement. We feel we have made significant movement but we feel like the district has been coming back with basically some version of the same amount.
We feel that if days are added to the salary schedule, that needs to be over and above anything that is to maintain comparability rather than a way to achieve comparability. Because, even though some of the districts do have more days, the numbers we’ve been using for comparison have been adjusted to be comparable to what our days are. So, we would have to really do a whole other set of numbers if we are going to start adding days on.
Just one last thing I do want to comment on, though, is that the employees are also making less this year because so far they have not been offered one dime of the compensation for staff development, which for the last several years, almost all employees of the district have made over $1,000 in additional money for paid staff development. This happened because in years past, as some of you may or may not remember if you were involved in education, we used to have 4 – 6 days that were taken out of the school year where students didn’t come to school and staff development programs were offered to the employees. The State decided they didn’t want students to be out of school those days and they decided to fund out of the 180 days staff development, which meant after school or summers, and they provided money to allow that to happen so that the students could be in school more often and that was what the buy–back days have been. It’s been a State–funded program, and it’s continued to be a State–funded program, only they did it differently this year in terms of a block grant. But the money is still there, it is still intended for staff development and yet no effort has been made to spend any of that to pay teachers for staff development. Unfortunately, this has put a freeze on staff–development in this district and I think it is going to have a detrimental effect if you do not figure out a way to get that negotiated and moving ahead in a positive direction. So, either to do that, if all our teachers have an interest in staff development. But, we don’t intend to work those 180 days and just do the staff development unpaid on our own time, that’s not what was intended in the State program, and that’s not why those days were eliminated for staff development. So, I’m hoping that because that is a monetary item, we need to include that probably in the monetary settlement we have come to an agreement on.
So, I’ve taken up more than my time and it’s all in the record. Thank you.
minutes/0506/010506min.html