CHENANGO COUNTY – Feeling a sense of equality among their counterparts is just one topic local school employees say is on the table in on-going contract negotiations.
Norwich Educational Support Staff Association (NESSA) President Patricia Pepe and Vice President Donald Tubbs say they will not back down when it comes to employee contracts this year. Operating under the same contract used in past years, roughly 200 Norwich City School District support staff employees will be without a new contract when school begins today.
According to a study conducted by DCMO BOCES, the Norwich support staff is currently earning wages that are 14.49 percent below the county’s median hourly salary for other support staff workers. “It would take a 14.49 percent raise not to bring us to the top, but to bring us to the median, the average of what other districts are paying,” said Tubbs.
“We want salaries that are competitive with those of our counterparts,” Pepe said. “We will do what we have to until we get a proper agreement,” adding that, “our concern is for the children. We will not make this an issue inside of the school buildings, but we want the community to be aware of what is going on.”
In previous two day-long sessions, Pepe says accompanying her and Tubbs to the bargaining table was David Schreiber, a representative from New York State United Teachers Union, as well as Norwich City School District representatives Mark Pettitt from DCMO BOCES, Kim Perez from human resources, Deputy Superintendent Margaret Boice, and Superintendent of Schools Gerard O’Sullivan.
Following the day-long bargaining sessions that ended with no finalized contract, Pepe and Tubbs said the administration proposed a 3 percent raise and a higher rate of pay for incoming staff. However, the district also proposed taking away the 100 percent health care coverage now offered and adding in a 10 percent employee pay-in plan. Tubbs said changing the health coverage so the employees would have to pay 10 percent of the cost would ultimately mean they’d be losing money each month.
“Many of the employees, depending on what area they work, are eligible for food stamps,” said Tubbs. Pepe says she, as well as the rest of the support staff, would like to see not only the new staff get increased wages but increases for the current staff as well.
Both Tubbs and Pepe agree one of the main concerns for a new contract is to gain retirement health coverage. Some members of the support staff have worked for the district for 20 to 30 years and when they retire they will have no health care coverage from the district. Out of the nine other districts in the county, only Norwich’s and Bainbridge-Guilford’s support service staffs are not offered retirement health care benefits.
“We are the biggest district, but yet the support staff receives nothing after years of service,” said Pepe.
NESSA representatives also say in addition to pay increases and better health care coverage, they would like to see binding arbitration added into their contract. Representatives say having someone un-biased deciding matters pertaining to them and the school should have been in place long before now. Norwich and Greene currently do not offer any kind of binding arbitration to their support staffs.
As the contract stands going into the 2007-08 school year, the support services staff is operating under the contract which expired June 30, meaning no one will gain or lose anything stipulated within the previous contract. The usual time for contract renewal are between three to five years.
Tubbs says after collecting data from the State Education department gathered in 2004 it states of the nine school districts in the county, Norwich has the highest income per pupil as well as the highest income per tax return. That said, he states based on the findings there is no indication that low support staff salaries can be based on resident income levels which show a higher salary could easily be supported.
Superintendent O’Sullivan said mediation has been scheduled for Oct. 29 and he is looking forward to working with mediators and resolving the contract issues. An e-mail to BOCES representative Mark Pettitt was not returned. As for the teachers contract which also expired June 30, negotiations are scheduled to begin tentatively in September.
Norwich City Schools is not the only district in the county encountering delays with contract negotiations. Superintendent of Greene Central Schools Gary Smith said the teacher and support staff contracts also expired in June and that negotiations are getting underway. Generally he says the teachers contract is done first, followed by the support staff. He states they have been meeting throughout the summer and everything looks to be headed in the right direction.
Afton Central school representatives says an agreement for the support staff workers should be settled within 30 days and Oxford Academy and Central Schools Superintendent Randall Squier says he is hopeful to set up dates in September and come to an agreement with the teacher representatives, but that the contracts had been put on the back burner due scheduling conflicts. Contracts are in order for Unadilla Valley, Otselic Valley, Sherburne-Earlville, Bainbridge-Guilford and Gilbertsville Mt. Upton.