Letter to the Board
Internal Claims Auditor Report
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| Report 3/2006 | |||
Discovered Condition
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Internal Auditor
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Suggested Corrective action plan
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Results of corrective action
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| Open purchase orders are not being monitored, lack of procedures Walmart open purchase orders are attached as and examples. | Claims were approved. | Procedures and guidelines for open purchase orders need to be written and communicated all users and monitoring of the procedures should be done at the building level. | |
Internal Claims Auditor Report
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| Report 3/2006 | |||
| Open Issues | |||
Discovered Condition
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Internal Auditor
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Suggested Corrective action plan
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Results of corrective action
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| Procedures and forms pending from 12/8/2005 report are still pending. | |||
Memorandum
To:
Board of Education
CC:
Greg Atseff, Mark Callahan
From:
Michael havens
Re:
WTA contract
Congratulations to your negotiations team who completed a tentative contract settlement with the WTA on Wednesday night. Your Board members, John and Rick served you well, putting in many hours and taking time from work to serve the district. Also a special thanks to Mark Callahan who has served as facilitator these last few meetings. As always the actual contract will not be printed and distributed for a couple months. We will be asking you to approve the contract at this meeting. I have listed below the changes we are recommending from its current form;
1. Duration: 5 years -July 1, 2006 – June 30th 2011
Comments: The five year contract is great for us. They were a little reluctant to go this far at first but we convinced them that it worked well for us this last time.
2. Salary increases: 2006-07 3.5%*
2007-08 4.25
2008-09 4.25
2009-10 4.25
2010-11 4.00+
* also adjust the sag for people earning significantly below their peers will the same years of training and degree status. This will be done by adjusting the midpoint of each salary step to be consistent with the midpoints of the Wayne – Finger Lakes BOCES comparative salary data.
+ The salary portion of the contract could be reopened by either party if the 4.00% is out of line with the cost of living index or area district settlements.
Comments: The 3.5% is actually a bit more if you add in the first year adjustments for those people who were working for less than their peers. Everyone felt this part had to be cleaned up though. There is a re-opener clause for the final year (2010-11), for either party, if inflation or settlements change drastically.
I know the 4.25% numbers may seem pretty large. There are a few other districts who have settled at this rate but not many. Getting the health care give-back (see 3) was a huge concession by the teachers and at least as important. Five years ago the staff asked us to give them a chance to show us how well they could do with our children. The academic achievement results speak for themselves. As do our school’s ranking among area Wayne and Monroe county districts.
3. Insurance: Move from the traditional Blue Million to the less expensive Blue point II with a $20 co-pay
Comments: This is a big one for us. They were already contributing 10% but their base policy was very expensive. They have agreed to change to a new plan that is currently much cheaper and has a higher ($20) co-pay. We have agreed to a 105 pre tax contribution for current staff. There will be no district contribution for new staff. You should be very pleased with this item.
4. Change the start of the school year from not being able to begin prior to September 1st to being able to do so when September 1st falls on a Friday or Saturday.
Comments: This is extremely helpful to us. We have the longest school year (188 days). Some years it is hard to get all the days in without starting prior Labor day. This language solves the issue
5. Teachers agree to do teachers conferences outside the school day i.e. before school, after school and evenings. In return teachers will have a ½ comp day.
Comments: This is a great one for us also. We piloted it in a couple of schools this year. With both parents working, we have to be willing to meet with them early in the morning or evening.
6. Expand bereavement days to include grandchildren and persons they are legally responsible for.
Comments: We had one of our Middle School teacher’s grandchildren die this year. If I went by the strict language of the contract, she wasn’t entitled to bereavement. I think it would have been callous not to provide it to her. This officially allows me to.
7. Expand family illness days to include persons they are legally responsible for.
Comments: If they are
legally
responsible for providing the to day to day care then they should be able to take a sick day for them.
8. Formation of a joint team to develop professional standards including those for dress
Comment: This one we really pushed for. While the “dress code” would be recommendations not law this is a big step in addressing both dress and professionalism. The association has also said that if there is a time when a staff member dresses inappropriately they would be willing to be the first person to make contact with the teacher to make a change.
9. Retirement incentive changed to read $1,000 per year of service with a minimum of 15 years to maximum of 25 years. There will be a one time opportunity for those already over 55 to receive this benefit.
Comment: This is a change from basing the incentive on sick days. Depending on the number of years of service vs. the number of sick days this could raise the incentive to a maximum of $25,000. This was a pretty sizeable increase from the $11,000 maximum in the current contract but put us in line with area school districts. Offering the incentive to over 55 this one year may also get us some retirements we need in order to balance the budget.
10. A committee will study and make recommendations about stipends for coaching and other stipended positions. Next year there will be a 4% increase in those stipends.
Comments: The stipend positions have not been seriously looked at for many years. Five years ago we applied a straight increase to them but did nothing to determine if the are over or under compensated.
11. Change in steps for grievance so that the individual staff member can not submit a grievance to
arbitration. It has to be approved and done by the association.
Comments: This is helpful to both of us. Under the current contract language an individual has
the right to bring an issue to arbitration even if the WTA disagrees with its merit. This is what
happened with the Ken Schaumberg grievance. They were forced to go along with it and pay for
it irregardless of whether or not it had merit. Now the individual can take it as far as the Board
of Education, but if it is going to go to arbitration the WTA has to decide that.
The association wanted binding arbitration. We are about the only school in the Rochester area that does not have it. We held tight and they finally gave up on it.
CONFIDENTIAL