Warwick teachers get 3% percent raises

Warwick teachers get 3% percent raises

District extends contract four years Intelligencer Journal

Lancaster New Era

Updated Nov 17, 2010 19:45

Lititz

By BRIAN WALLACE, Staff Writer

Warwick school board Tuesday night approved a contract extension with its 371 unionized teachers that will boost their pay by an average 3 percent in each of the next four years.

The "early-bird" extension, which won't take effect until the 2011-12 school year, was unanimously approved.

The pact was negotiated quietly and quickly, in contrast to the last contract, which was approved in 2008, nearly a year after the previous pact had expired.

Those lengthy talks, which eventually were settled with the help of a state mediator, became so contentious that teachers took out a newspaper advertisement to decry the lack of progress.

This time around, Warwick teachers and board members began informal negotiations last summer without professional negotiators, attorneys or mediators at the table. By law, the talks didn't even have to start until January 2011.

The contract extension will boost teacher pay by an average of 2.99 percent, or $1,975, per year. Overall, salaries will rise by a cumulative 12.5 percent by the contract's end.

The raises are below the average of 3.77 percent per year awarded in teacher contract settlements in Lancaster County over the last 18 months. They're also well below the 3.99 percent annual raises Warwick teachers are receiving in their current contract.

But unlike most other recent contracts, the Warwick extension does not include concessions by teachers on such items as health care co-pays and personal days.

Despite the lack of such cost-saving "givebacks," the contract "makes a statement" by keeping raises below 3 percent, school board president Dr. Timothy Quinn said.

"I'm pleased that we could work amicably with the teachers in these economic times and come in significantly below the county average," he said of the agreement.

The board pursued an extension instead of a new contract, he said, because members felt the district has already made "good headway" in shifting more health care costs to teachers under the current contract.

"We feel comfortable with the health care progress we made," he said. "We have some of the highest deductibles in the county."

The teachers' union voted Nov. 8 to approve the contract extension.

Warwick Education Association president Lisa Hochleiter declined to disclose the results of the vote, saying the membership voted to keep it sealed.

She also would not say whether the vote was close or overwhelmingly in favor of the extension.

Getting teachers to approve raises that are markedly lower than those awarded their peers in other districts was not difficult, she said.

"The membership is really a great group of teachers, and they were OK with that," she said. "It might have been a hard sell somewhere else, but not here."

The contract extension will boost the starting salary for a new teacher from $43,624 this year to $47,224 in 2014-15. The average teacher salary is projected to rise from $63,169 this year to $71,069 in the final year of the extension.

The raises are projected to cost the district an additional $607,783 next year, $625,956 in 2012-13, $644,672 in 2013-14 and $663,948 in 2014-15. Compounded, the cost of the raises over four years is $6.26 million.

Hochleiter expressed relief that negotiations are behind her.

"I think the definite positive is it's a four-year agreement, and it allows us to move forward as teachers and educate our students, and I'm very excited about that," she said.

Two other Lancaster County school districts — Manheim Central and Solanco — are continuing negotiations on teacher contracts that expired last school year.

Octorara, Penn Manor and School District of Lancaster are scheduled to begin negotiations by January, as are teachers with Lancaster County Career and Technology Center.

Contracts for those four groups of teachers expire June 30, 2011.

Correspondent Laura Knowles contributed to this story.



bwallace@lnpnews.com





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