‘A slap in the face’

$1.6M raise for Gilford teachers loses Budget Committee support

By GAIL OBER, LACONIA DAILY SUN

GILFORD — With $1.6 million in raises for teachers at stake, at least two members of the Budget Committee have said they will not support the proposed increase in teacher salaries as negotiated by the School Board and the Gilford Education Association.

"This is a slap in the face of the Gilford taxpayers," said Budget Committee Vice Chairman Kevin Leandro.

Budget Committee Chairman Norman Silber and Leandro said that, in their opinion, the contract was not negotiated on behalf of the wishes and desires of the Gilford taxpayers.

"As it stands right now, I don't think it's going to pass the Budget Committee," Leandro said Thursday.

The teachers union and the School Board, whose negotiating team was Sue Allen and Karen Thurston, agreed to a contract that calls for a school year 2017-2018 increase in salaries of $296,819. The second year calls for an additional raise of $258,198 plus the $296,000 from the first year or $538,017. The third year, 2019-2020 calls for an additional $245,392 plus the previous $538,017 or $783,449. The total increases in salary and benefits over the next three years will be $1,618,285 more that this year.

Leandro said that based on today's total assessed property values and using 7 cents per $1,000 for a tax rate calculation, this could bump the tax rate 21 cents per $1,000 valuation in the first contract year, 38 cents in the second contract year, and 55 cents in the third year.

"This is the cost before the school buys one computer or one book, and it's a time of declining enrollments." said Leandro.

Leandro and Silber contend that while these increases include a provision in the contract that the teachers gradually pay more of the cost of the premiums for their health insurance, from 5 percent in year 1 of the contract, graduating in steps to 10 percent of the premium in year 3, the three-year contract does not consider any future increases in health insurance costs.

"I'm sure not going to bet that health insurance costs will drop over the next three years," said Leandro.

Another bone of contention the leadership of the Budget Committee has with the proposed contract is the small amount of increase that teachers will pay for their insurance.

Leandro said he would have liked to see it go up 5 percent each year of the contract to where teachers would be paying 20 percent of their premiums by school year 2019-2020.

Both Kirk Beitler and Leandro say the Gilford School District's insurance plan qualifies as a "Cadillac plan" under the terms of the Affordable Care Act, however, in 2015 Congress delayed the excise tax provisions, meaning they wont come into effect until 2020.

Silber and Leandro have sent a request to Beitler asking him to request the School Board try to renegotiate the contract to prevent it from getting a non-support vote from the Budget Committee, which means it has a greater chance of failing during the March town vote.

The School Board next meets at 7:30 a.m. on Jan. 3. The agenda is to complete its work on the default budget, which has also not met muster with the Budget Committee.