When Davis voters approved Measure C on March 6, the parcel tax would generate enough annual revenue to save around 87 jobs that could have faced elimination had the measure failed.However, even with that passage, the district still faces a 3.5 million dollar budget shortfall that the district is calling a structural deficit. As a result, a total of 57 teachers and staff members now face a layoff despite the passage of Measure C.
Assistant Superintendent Matt Best, who now heads up HR, indicated, “There are only a very limited number of factors that will affect a reduction in the number of layoffs.”
The factors include things like retirement and resignations, improvement in the state budget projections and the influx of one-time money.
Some have called on teachers to make employee concessions.
That has proven to be controversial. Back in early February, a former DTA President called for employee concessions.
Ingrid Salim wrote to the Davis Enterprise to call upon her fellow teachers to step up.
“I urge the Davis Teachers Association leadership to poll their members to gauge interest in a shortened school year and other concessions in order to mitigate those layoffs. We did this once before, a few years ago, and were able to save many employees’ jobs, keep class sizes reasonable and keep programs intact,” she argued.
Ms. Salim concluded: “If DTA were to direct our Negotiations Committee to do something similar this year, pink slips to compensate for the deficit might be avoided altogether, reducing the anxiety so many face each year in these uncertain times.”
However, the current DTA President Gail Mitchell said we should not ask teachers to take concessions.
She writes: “Recent items in The Davis Enterprise made a surprising call for pay cuts and a shortened academic year. Measure C results aren’t in, the state budget hasn’t been passed, and community input has not been sought – and, yet, district officials and individuals are already arguing that we have to look to the classroom for cuts first.”
“We’ve been down this road before. Last year, five fewer school days and higher class sizes led to lower test scores and cuts in essential curriculum. Pay cuts, which occurred at the same time as increased costs of benefits, were demoralizing and, in some cases, led teachers to seek employment elsewhere or even to leave the profession altogether,” she continued.
“It’s time to change the conversation. If we value education, we need to value the work of teachers,” she concludes. “We can’t solve a long-term structural deficit with short-term pay cuts that ask even more from the teachers who already have given so much.”
Now another former DTA President, Steven Kelleher, has written in to blame the board’s fiscal practices.
He writes, “I would like to correct a misstatement in Tuesday’s article on layoffs. Matt Best, the school district’s director of human resources, stated that the structural deficit facing the district was caused by the expense of step and column movements. This is incorrect.”
Instead, he argues, “Teachers move up the pay scale based on years of experience and educational level. However, as teachers retire from the top pay level, approximately $77,000, younger teachers are hired at a much lower salary. New teachers make between $34,000 and $40,000. This results in a net savings of more than $30,000 per new hire.”
“This more than compensates for the increased costs of step and column movement,” he said.
He adds, “In addition, teachers in Davis have almost never received the full cost-of-living adjustment given by the state. The district always insists on some share of the COLA to “finance step and column costs.””
The cause of the structural deficit? Mr. Kelleher argues it is due “to the board’s overspending on the budget year after year. It is not solely due to state budget cuts.”
“Bruce Colby, associate superintendent for business services, identified a structural deficit when he first arrived more than five years ago,” he writes. “The board has done little to curb spending since that time. For instance, they recently increased administrator salaries and benefits by $240,000 in the same year that the state cut the budget by $2.2 million.”
“It is the board’s responsibility to ensure that its spending habits conform to sound budgetary practices,” he continues. “The Davis Teachers Association repeatedly has asked the board to adopt a ‘budget-neutral’ practice. They should not expand or start a program if there is no new money identified to finance it. The board has rejected this obviously practical approach, stating that it is too confining for its decision-making process.”
The bottom line for him, “Despite the generous bond measure that this community has passed, we still face cuts to the classroom. The board’s poor fiscal practice has come home to roost and our children’s education will suffer for it.”
—David M. Greenwald reporting
I wondered why Steven Kelleher didn’t write this before Measure C. This gets to the nuts and bolts of criticism of the Board and how many of us want to see change in how we do things in DJUSD, not band aid fixes of same old business as usual.
Can you shed more light on $240K recent increase in salaries? When and how? Sounds like the Regents.
A couple of things:
1) There are three practical approaches to addressing a $3.5 million structural deficit: expenditure cuts, revenue increases, combination of the two. Has the school board conducted an analysis of amount and types of local revenue increases are required to raise an additional $3.5 million? For example, the assessed value of local real estate would have to increase $XXX to generate an additional $3.5 million p.a. Such an analysis would help me understand the magnitude of the challenge.
2) I do not like to see any employee competently doing their job work harder for less pay, certainly not teachers. However, that’s exactly what has been happening in the private sector these past 4 years. There are many employees working more efficiently, longer hours, for less pay. That’s what happens when an economy retrenches. I should hope the school board takes private sector reality into consideration should a proposal to shorten the school year come before it. In my view, shortening the school year should be taken off the table.
DT Businessman (aka Michael Bisch)
[quote]”Bruce Colby, associate superintendent for business services, identified a structural deficit when he first arrived more than five years ago,” he writes. “The board has done little to curb spending since that time. For instance, they recently increased administrator salaries and benefits by $240,000 in the same year that the state cut the budget by $2.2 million.”[/quote]
This is very troubling, especially in light of expecting teachers to “share the sacrifice”… are they going to “share the administrative raise”?
[quote]”It is the board’s responsibility to ensure that its spending habits conform to sound budgetary practices,” he continues. “The Davis Teachers Association repeatedly has asked the board to adopt a “budget-neutral” practice. They should not expand or start a program if there is no new money identified to finance it. The board has rejected this obviously practical approach, stating that it is too confining for its decision-making process.”[/quote]
Sounds like good advice to me, yet it appears to have been rejected by the school board. Very troubling…
[quote]In my view, shortening the school year should be taken off the table. [/quote]
Amen!
“I wondered why Steven Kelleher didn’t write this before Measure C.”
Probably because he wanted to address this issue not sabotage the Measure C process.
I agree that taking the shortening of the school year off the table is essential.
I think the district needs to sit down now that Measure C is over and create a three tiered prioritization of programs. One set for good times, a middle range, and an austerity set.
One way to deal with these issues is to let people know up front when they get hired what group they are going into so that it is not a surprise.
The issue that Steve Kelleher raises isn’t new. It showed up in the editorial pages of the Enterprise before and has been mostly forgotten.
This was the previous iteration:
Steven Kelleher, DTA negotiator, Oct. 3, 2010 ([url]http://www.davisenterprise.com/Archived-Stories-0/letters-spendthrift-practices-criticized/[/url])
Richard Harris, school board member, Oct. 3, 2010 ([url]http://www.davisenterprise.com/Archived-Stories-0/Administrators_gave_up_salary/[/url])
There is some additional context, however.
At the Feb. 7, 2008 school board meeting, the board approved an agreement ([url]https://davis.csbaagendaonline.net/cgi-bin/WebObjects/davis-eAgenda.
woa/files/MTMzMjE5MTU5Mjg5NC9kYXZpc2VBZ2VuZGEvNDkvNzg2L0ZpbGVz/dta_tentat
ive_agreement.pdf[/url]) with DTA for a 1% increase on salaries, 2% increase toward health benefits, and a one-time 1% bonus for all teachers. This was something that DTA pushed for very hard. The ongoing cost of those compensation increases is about $1 million/year. CSEA also reached a similar agreement at the time, and a similar increase was promised to administrators. The very next school board meeting, Feb. 21, 2008, we entered the current era of school budget reductions in Davis ([url]https://davis.csbaagendaonline.net/cgi-bin/WebObjects/davis-eAgenda.
woa/files/MTMzMjE5MjU5NDQyNS9kYXZpc2VBZ2VuZGEvNTYvODg3L0ZpbGVz/102-21-07_
bs_-_board_budget_update.pdf[/url]), and those pink slips were proposed at that point. As it happened, the Davis community was generous in fundraising and in passing Measure W in November 2008.
The increases that the administrators have received are the equivalent increases to their healthcare and salaries that the teachers received. Most administrators are on a fixed salary schedule ([url]http://www.djusd.net/employment/altsalsched11-12[/url]) of increases, the same as teachers ([url]http://www.djusd.net/employment/certsal1112[/url]). Administrators have been taking an ongoing 2% cut in salary for at least the last couple of years.
At present the DTA leadership appears not to be inclined to take any concessions. But I don’t think they have asked their membership what they think of this particular issue. That was the point of Ingrid Salim’s letter ([url]http://www.davisenterprise.com/opinion/letters/dta-action-could-avoid-layoffs/[/url]).
Comments: I don’t begrudge DTA seeking to get paid what they think is a fair compensation for their members. But I do have a problem with the apparent callous disregard of the DTA for the fiscal effect of that raise on the job security of their newer colleagues. I believe that the DTA leadership knew that the spring 2008 pink slips would be a consequence of that contract agreement.
I also think it is appropriate to poll the membership. It is not in uniform agreement with the leadership. Obviously the teachers with pink slips would not mind seeing concessions made. But I think the 2008 contract agreement and the pink slips that came out immediately after caused some rifts in point of view of the membership. To refuse to poll in this instance probably jeopardizes the future unity of their organization.
My links to 2008 school board agenda material are bad. You can search for yourself in the archived agenda material here ([url]http://davis.csbaagendaonline.net/cgi-bin/WebObjects/davis-eAgenda.woa/wa/displayCalendar[/url]).
Can someone shed light on the $240K administrator salary hike?
“I wondered why Steven Kelleher didn’t write this before Measure C.”
Probably because he wanted to address this issue not sabotage the Measure C process.
which seems corrupt to me. If they knew there was mismanagement, they should let the public know ahead of time BEFORE C PASSES. The public needs to know what they are getting into with the taxes they are passing.
SODA: [i]Can someone shed light on the $240K administrator salary hike?[/i]
See links I posted above for Kelleher’s and Harris’ 2010 letters. It is part of the pay increases that everyone received in 2008, including teachers.
91 Octane: [i]which seems corrupt to me. If they knew there was mismanagement, they should let the public know ahead of time BEFORE C PASSES. The public needs to know what they are getting into with the taxes they are passing.[/i]
It has been out there. See the dates of the letters I linked. At present this is the context to an argument over how to close the remaining $3.5 million deficit. Measure C covers $6.5 million. The remainder can be closed by cuts alone (which is the path we’re on now) or by some concessions.
[quote]The increases that the administrators have received are the equivalent increases to their healthcare and salaries that the teachers received. Most administrators are on a fixed salary schedule of increases, the same as teachers.[/quote]Ok… teachers have a 20 step ‘automatic range’, where admin has 7… independent of COLA’s for cost of living… City employees have five. wdf, what is your point other than teachers are more special than other employees serving the public?
The $240,000 increase in administrative costs came in two parts about 3 years ago.
$140,000 went to the top 4 district administrators as a pay increase. Some of these contracts included automatic pay increases. According to the Enterprise, Mr. Colby, the Assoc. Supe. of Business Services, has received over 16% in additional pay increases since then.
$100,000 went to the administrative health plan which covers the other administrators in the district.
Teacher increases as described by wdf1 were negotiated from money given by the state the district for Cost of Living Adjustments, COLA. Teachers voted to put a portion of this onto their health care schedule to defray the cost of rising premiums. Administrators voted to put all of theirs onto their salary schedule.
Again, this was money given to the district by the state. It was an increase in revenue.
The $240,000 was not from increased revenue, in fact the state cut the budget that year. So it had to be funded by cuts to services.
It is not that administrators don’t work hard and don’t deserve pay increases. It’s a tough job and the workload has increased substantially. Just as primary terachers’ workload has increased by over 25%.
But giving a pay raise when the state is cutting revenue is a bad fiscal decision.
It’s not that administrators don’t deserve a reasonable health care plan, they do. But they had the opportunity to improve theirs and they opted not to do so. For the Board to burden the budget at this time with additional demands is a bad fiscal decision.
I’m not sure where wdf1 gets the $1 million ongoing teacher costs since Mr. Colby’s budget shows that step and column costs are $500,000, a cost defrayed by retiring teachers, and the district capped their share of health care costs years ago. There are additional errors in wdf’s write up as well, but they’re not really germane.
The issue of pink slips is a sensitive one. The Board has pink slipped hundreds of teachers over the past several years for no apparent reason. Only one teacher has actually been laid off and she was immediately rehired. It seems to be a valuable fundraising tool however.
As far as Ingrid’s point about administrative “step and column” is concerned, her point lacks validity. All one needs to do is compare the salary of a 20+year veteran teacher with a newly minted administrator. Teachers receive a far lower salary, but have the comfort of a slight increase each year. Administrators start off higher and climb higher, but have fewer steps along the way. Each system has its advantages, and an individual gets to choose which they prefer.
One last note, why would the DTA poll its membership about concessions when the district/Board has not even formally asked for them? The district seems to be trying to negotiate this point in articles to the Enterprise. (such as the one which precipitated this whole blog string)
SK: [i]The $240,000 increase in administrative costs came in two parts about 3 years ago. $140,000 went to the top 4 district administrators as a pay increase. Some of these contracts included automatic pay increases. According to the Enterprise, Mr. Colby, the Assoc. Supe. of Business Services, has received over 16% in additional pay increases since then.[/i]
Are you comparing apples to apples? There are employee benefits that are not accounted for in the DTA contract salary scale, but that are paid by the employer (CalSTRS, health benefits). In 2011, it appears that Colby’s contract went from a defined benefit retirement to a defined contribution plan, with the contributions defined in the contract. That would look like a bigger raise than is actually the case.
Also, Colby’s contract includes this statement: “In the event the Board of Trustees approves a reduction in total compensation for employees in the certificated bargaining unit during any year of this agreement, the annual salary of the Associate Superintendent shall be reduced by a corresponding equivalent % for the same period.” As well, there are no automatic raises any more. I understand that this (no automatic raise, plus the clause above) will be the case for other top administrators. Two contracts are supposed to come up for a board vote, probably at the next meeting. To me this looks like the equivalent of freezing step and column increases, at least for the top administrators.
In the past three years, when Hammond left, his replacement (Roberson) was offered a lower salary. When French left, his replacement (Best) was also given a lower salary. And administrators are taking a 2% salary cut.
SK: [i]Teacher increases as described by wdf1 were negotiated from money given by the state the district for Cost of Living Adjustments, COLA.[/i]
And since then, the state has provided less money to the district (and all other districts state-wide), so the concept of a COLA isn’t rooted in reality.
When the 2008 DTA-negotiated raises were passed, it was clear enough that we were headed into an economic downturn. I make this point to dispute your claim that “The Davis Teachers Association repeatedly has asked the board to adopt a “budget-neutral” practice.” That raise wasn’t a budget neutral practice in hindsight.
SK: [i]I’m not sure where wdf1 gets the $1 million ongoing teacher costs since Mr. Colby’s budget shows that step and column costs are $500,000, a cost defrayed by retiring teachers, and the district capped their share of health care costs years ago.[/i]
The $1 million I refer to is the added annual cost of financing the raises that were approved in Feb. 2008.
SK: [i]The district seems to be trying to negotiate this point in articles to the Enterprise.[/i]
I am unaware of any district official writing a piece in the Enterprise to advocate for making concessions. Matt Best laid out some typical language about budget alternatives when quoted by Jeff Hudson. However, Ms. Mitchell, and Ms. Salim have written rather explicit pieces connected to that issue. Your letter, while not outright addressing the issue of concessions, appears to be a prelude to saying no or to driving a hard bargain (which looks like negotiating in the Enterprise).
In budget discussions during the public portion of school board meetings, individual school board members have said that they would like to see if employees are open to concessions.
SK: [i]I’m not sure where wdf1 gets the $1 million ongoing teacher costs since Mr. Colby’s budget shows that step and column costs are $500,000, a cost defrayed by retiring teachers, and the district capped their share of health care costs years ago.[/i]
The $1 million I refer to is the added annual cost of financing the raises that were approved in Feb. 2008.
SK: [i]The Board has pink slipped hundreds of teachers over the past several years for no apparent reason. Only one teacher has actually been laid off and she was immediately rehired. It seems to be a valuable fundraising tool however.[/i]
The comment about pink-slipping being a valuable fundraising tool seems like a cynical and ungrateful comment for someone like you to be making in public.
Public data from the state says that there were 376 full-time equivalent teachers last year and 430 the year before; current year is not yet published there (ed-data). That looks like a real enough staff reduction to me.
You present the pink slipping as if it is a false alarm, implying that it is a false alarm this time, too. When I read what is going on in other districts, it looks real enough to me. There are a lot of unemployed teachers out there. Some newer teachers hired in the district were pink-slipped in other districts. They might have a different view of what’s going on.
SK: [i]As far as Ingrid’s point about administrative “step and column” is concerned, her point lacks validity.[/i]
Your point here is unclear as far as I’m concerned.
wdf1: [i]In 2011, it appears that Colby’s contract went from a defined benefit retirement to a defined contribution plan, with the contributions defined in the contract.[/i]
After a little more research, I learn that Colby’s contract did not have a change in the retirement plan, but rather included a payment for him to purchase a healthcare plan of his choosing, which apparently is cheaper for the district.
SK: [i]Mr. Colby’s budget shows that step and column costs are $500,000, a cost defrayed by retiring teachers,[/i]
I’m not sure where Kelleher get $500K. This is what the district reports:
[quote]DJUSD Budget FAQ’s ([url]http://www.djusd.net/district/business/budget/questions[/url]):
Are step and column increases still in place for district employees? If so, what is the cost and how is it paid?
Step and column increases remain in place. The annual cost for all employees is $700,000 from the general operating fund. In normal years, 30-50% of this would be defrayed by teacher retirements, that is, the salary difference between a new and a senior teacher. The remainder would have been covered by cost of living adjustment (COLA) to the district’s state funding. The state has not fully funded COLA since 2007.
For the 2010-11 school year, the Davis Teachers Association requested and was given a teacher retirement incentive to accelerate retirement savings to decrease layoffs of less senior teachers. The district offered a cost neutral incentive paid over five years by these savings. During this period, retirement savings are not available to fund step and column increases.
To address future funding shortfalls, the Board of Education acted last spring to negotiate new contracts that eliminate automatic step increases for administrators.[/quote]