Monday, October 26, 2009

Teachers' contracts in area towns

From the Courant on Southington:

Southington Teachers To Forgo Pay Raise

From the NHRegister on North Haven:

Teachers’ pact bows to economy

But apparently Cheshire is different at least according to one Council member:



Or you can watch the entire November 12, 2008 discussion on the teachers' contract here and here.

And if you want to step back in time to get a sense of "where we were" when the Council adopted the current contract, click here. I still don't understand why it was adopted without further negotiations. Remember - it was adopted after the bailout.

Time for a change....

Tim White

41 comments:

Anonymous said...

4.4% per year for three years...Can someone please confirm this is the case and WHY did we agree to this?

Ask the Pratt people getting laid off how they feel about it.

Anonymous said...

This is the Democrat strategy. If you scream loud enough and long enough about the nickels, you can distract the voters from the dollars you wasted. And sadly, they are getting away with it.

We will be paying for more than a decade for the Democrats warped concept of "fiscal responsibility"....i.e. write a blank check to the teacher's union

Contoured Views said...

Look at what New Haven did. They gave 3% increase.
The best part of their contract is they are including student performance in teacher's evaluations. If they don't perform well then they have to go through a mentoring program. If they don't improve in a 120 day period they can be terminated.
This is what our town needs. We have many good teachers, but we also have some that are too complacent.
Lets hope in the future the BOE will look at New Haven as a model to do a teacher's contract the right way.

Anonymous said...

"Dr. Florio stated that as of the last State recorded data, the per pupil cost in Cheshire is $10,700." From the 04/02/09 TC minutes. How much of the $10,700 is comprised of teacher/administrator salaries and benefits?

"The majority of the education budget is the cost of staff. The recent settlement with the Cheshire teacher union calls for a
4.4% increase in salaries in 2009/10. While this mediated agreement was reached only a few days before the financial markets
collapsed,
it is not the only factor driving the budget cost increase." - Dr. Florio Source: http://www.cheshire.k12.ct.us/files/11698D818CD744C690558836744F9A7D.pdf

"These are unprecedented times. It is my hope that in a time that sacrifice is required, that sacrifice will come from all. It is
unreasonable to ask taxpayers to shoulder an undue burden given the economic uncertainty we face."
Dr. Florio
http://www.cheshire.k12.ct.us/files/11698D818CD744C690558836744F9A7D.pdf

But, in the end the BOE of DID ask, force actually, the taxpayers to shoulder not only the burden of the bloated BOE budget but the burden of the salary increases.

BTW, speaking of sacrifices...how much did the teacher's union sacrifice this year? ZERO.

Great job BOE!

Anonymous said...

You forgot to mention the fact the Plainville also took a freeze for one year. When the BOE comes this year with a new budget they should ask the teachers in Cheshire to make concessions. The taxpayers in Cheshire do not have bottomless pockets. If the Dem's have the majority they will probably tell the taxpayers to pound sand.

Anonymous said...

" If the Dem's have the majority they will probably tell the taxpayers to pound sand."

They did exactly that at the BOE Candidate forum and at the Town Council candidate forum. In fact, Mr. Mrowka proposed a mill-rate increase at the BOE candidate forum to pay for the yet undefined 'needs' next year.

As for concessions...does anyone really believe that the BOE, well at least the majority, is going to ask for concessions from the union?!? Matt Altieri will become a Republican before the BOE asks for concessions.

Anonymous said...

Approval of the teacher contract of 4.4% was gross mis-management by the Democrats. And. they claim sound fiscal policy, what a joke.

The Democratic town council is incompetent and only serves the special interests.

Anonymous said...

Less students---more teachers---more money.
That's the Democrats hard at work!

Anonymous said...

Last boe budget they did look towards the teachers' union for concession. But as Florio stated at a meeting, talks continue, but the teachers' union doesn't want to be the "first" to make a move. Well, I guess this coming budget they can finally make some concessions. It won't be a "first" as we've seen several towns take that step.

I wonder what their reason this year will be to avoid concessions.

Anonymous said...

Alteri thinks the increases are fine? Of course he does. Since he is a teacher in Wallingford he will benefit from Cheshire's increase. How you might ask?
Simple: when the negotiations for Wallingford contract come up, the union guys will show examples of "surrounding towns'" salaries. These will be used to argue for "fairness", "parity", etc etc etc.
The good citizens of Wallingford will be held up by the education goon squad......and Cheshire will be part of the evidence. They go from town to town like locusts...eating the taxpayers' money. The best part is they use the salaries derived from a corrupt salary system in one town to justify increases in another. And the music plays on. The Cheshire contract that was approved last fall in the midst of an economic meltdown is enough reason to vote the Dems OUT.
By the way, isn't Adinolfi's wife a teacher? Hmmmm. Nice raise Justin. You can buy lots of ads with that.

Anonymous said...

"By the way, isn't Adinolfi's wife a teacher? Hmmmm. Nice raise Justin. You can buy lots of ads with that."

She sure is and I wouldn't be a bit surprised if the W/S Malls is helping with these high priced ads. No other candidate seems to be spending as much.

If he's elected, he can vote his wife a raise.

Anonymous said...

TV adds??? Deep pockets come from??? What a joke.

Anonymous said...

Don't canidates have to disclose all contributions?

How do we find out who is paying for the ads?

I wonder if every member of his family will be down as a contributor including children and pets.

Anonymous said...

He is not Al's son?

Anonymous said...

No relation between Al Adinolfi and Justin....politically or biologically!

As for the Mall....yes, Justin is Mall Man. He was up to his eyeballs in trying to help WS....no citizen worked harder to get that passed. I hope the people on Cheshire Street and Peck Lane are paying attention. They will become the by-passes when traffic on Rt 10 chokes the town.
But then again, no...the developers say there won't be much traffic impact. After all, you ALWAYS build 500,000 sq ft of retail and then hope no one shows up.
Justin is a self-promoting fool.

Anonymous said...

The Dems didn't want to spend $20,000 to send this contract back, but it's alright to have the taxpayers pay accumulative costs over time in the millions. If I hear one more teacher or Board of Ed member say how not accepting their budget "will hurt the children" I'm going to scream. The Dems all need to be sent packing, on the council and BOE (especially Mrowka).

Anonymous said...

It's much harder working in New Haven than Cheshire. The NH teachers deserve the 4.4% and Cheshire 3%. Go figure.

Anonymous said...

Another rep waste first $200k for buses then $50k for garbarge now $20k more for the teacher contract. When you fight you can lose and the contract award can be higher then the settled amount. The difference could have been much more than the $200k already wasted.

Anonymous said...

Every other town is coming in way below 4.4% and you cowards on the Democratic Town Committee threw in the towel rather than spend the pittance to save this town real money.

Lemma ask this. When a DTC member needs to go to the bathroom does he need to borrow the key from Jeff Leake?

Anonymous said...

7:12PM What world are you living in? The economy was crashing, banks needed bailout money, there was talk of another great depression and the teachers were going to get more in arbitration. Only the Dems would see that logic.

Anonymous said...

....yes, Justin is Mall Man"

No one could have worked harder for W/S's Mall application. He was a one man paperhanger with his sidekick Scanlon. He was everywhere promoting the conversion of good industrially zoned land that could provide good paying jobs to zoning that allowed more high density housing and retail store that provide low paying jobs.

You can bet that if he is elected he wiil most likely continue to work for the mall operators under the guise of increasing tax revenue.

Contoured Views said...

7:12

You must be some sort of idiot.

It was not a definite that there would be legal fees. What if they voted no to the 4.4% and there was no fight, just negotiations?
What if we still had legal fees, but saved a lot more than $20k by winning?

Your analogy is exactly the reason why we have no fiscal responsibility. Rather than fight or follow procedure, you would just give in and renew contracts without bids and let teachers dictate to us what we will give them.

When does it end??

Lets hope on November 2!

Anonymous said...

7:12 p.m. I'd bet you don't like the state attorney general for some reason either. Relative to the town finally seeing the light and demanding that trash contracts be bid competitively in the light of day maybe you should read this morning's article on page A3 of the WR newspaper. I guess it's fair to say in the recent past residents were the victims of a massive fraud and after that we are just supposed to hand over a new no-bid contract to one of the companies involved. You have to be kidding and anyone supporting no bids in this environment just has to be kidding too.

In part it says:

"... On Tuesday, Attorney General Richard Blumenthal an nounced that his office and the Department of Consumer Protection are suing Galante to compensate former customers. The central allegation is that Galante artificially raised prices on commercial and resi dential customers through his criminal conspiracy. He controlled 25 different companies.

“James Galante master minded the conspiracy, profited from it and now we want money back for the consumers who suffered inflated costs for trash hauling as a result of ... Galante’s racketeering and bid rigging,” Blumenthal said.

Last September, a federal judge sentenced Galante to 87 months in prison after he pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy, conspiracy to defraud the Internal Revenue Service and wire-fraud con spiracy. Another 32 co-conspirators also pleaded guilty to various charges. ..."

Anonymous said...

"Another rep waste first $200k for buses then $50k for garbarge now $20k more for the teacher contract. When you fight you can lose and the contract award can be higher then the settled amount. The difference could have been much more than the $200k already wasted."

This is atypical democrat thinking at its finest and the problem we have with majority leadership in town. I think the quote above speaks for itself.

Anonymous said...

The real question is why were these contracts dealt with so late, so close to their expiration?
The BOE should be asking the Supt why a multi-year multi-million dollar contract wasn't handled earlier in the year so everyone would have time to deal with it. Ditto the trash deal. When you go out late to bid you naturally end up with fewer bidders since companies don't have time to do the proper analysis.
The Dem's are trying to blame the R's for following standard business procedure and keeping the town from getting caught in a bad deal.
Claiming a greater expense for these contracts may not be accurate. If we accepted a one year extension and then went for a five year contract bid next year don't you think the total price might be a lot higher......Obama inflation is coming and everything is going to cost more. Locking in a "more expensive" contract now is going to look brilliant in hindsight.
Bravo the R's!

Anonymous said...

"Obama inflation is coming and everything is going to cost more."


You have a short memory. We're in this mess because of the Bush's failed administration. You can't shift the balme. Imagine if Bush had 4 more years where this country would be.

Remember the Iraq war? It's cost over a trillion dollars for an unessary war. Remember it was Bush who implemented Medicare Prescription Dugs without paying for it. Remember it was Bush who gave the rich a tax break that has cost over a tillion dollars.

So, stop complaining over something you don't understand.

Anonymous said...

Inflation has already hit Cheshire ask the BOE about the bus contract, thank you republicans.

Diversion Tactics said...

Inflation has already hit Cheshire ask the BOE about the bus contract, thank you republicans.

Hindsight is always 20/20 and the Democrats are great at it. We don't need hindsight at this point, we need leaders that are going to solve the actual problem at hand which is looking at why/how the bid process started late.

We need leaders that make certain that no council, board or commission is operating in a manner that does not allow them to run an efficient bidding process and leaves no choices but to accept a compromise at the expense of taxpayers. The bus contract, union contact are GREAT examples of this. Great job dems! But it doesn't help anyone....

Diversion...it's what's for dinner, for the Democrats in Cheshire.

Anonymous said...

Hey, 11:41....I was no fan of Bush but his deficit spending was NOTHING compared to what is happening now. If you haven't noticed, Obama is president and it is time that he stop blaming everything on previous administration. Someone has got to stop the unbelievable spending....and we haven't even gotten to Obamacare yet!

Anonymous said...

Hey all you 4.4% supporters.....

1. 5yr growth of CT population 0% (less when you take out illegal immigration)

2. 20 year change in # of jobs in Connecticut 0%

3. Social Security COLA for 2010 0%

4. COLA increase for Aetna pensions (for those who didn't lose their entirely several years ago) -1.7%
(Also will probably apply to other large companies when COLA's are announced)

5. % increase in wages for Cheshire P&W workers -100%

Where do you think the money for the BOE wage increases is going to come from? And please explain why everyone's standard of living must be pinched so educators can be 13.8% richer in three years? It is unfair and bordering on the immoral.

Anonymous said...

Aetna pensions are going DOWN 1.7%

P&W salaries are DOWN 100%......looks like hyphen fell in the wrong place.

Anonymous said...

Yep. Let's save $29K and cost the town $20M over the next decade or so.

It's like claiming Obama doesn;t like deficits after he's spent twice as much on bailouts in one year than Bush spent on wars in eight.

GOP is finished said...

yep, lets save over a million a year by getting rid of the whiners at 500 highland avenue that are the laughing stock of the state and hire the state police. no building no overtime, no equipment no heart and hypertension the state funds everything not a resident trooper but actual state police to patrol cheshire. no problem getting candidates look at the unemployment rate and unemployed veterans. sounds like a plan.

Anonymous said...

There should be a new rule put in place. Anyone running for an elected position cannot have any member of their immediate family employed by the Town or the BOE.

How can anyone that has spent a lifetime as an educator have anything other than a partisan view when it comes to the BOE and their business? How can a retired teacher vote no to a teachers contract?

Anonymous said...

And how could a football coach's brother vote no to artificial turf?

Anonymous said...

I have one question, if the Dems only want turf and they have had control for four years and six of the last eight, why have they not done it yet? Why wait? Does that make any sense?

Anonymous said...

I still haven't seen any one of the cowards on the Democratic Town Committee defend giving away the most lucrative teacher's contract in the state.

Jeff Leake not giving you your talking points yet?

And please, we simply signed off over tens of millions of dollars of expenditures insead of spending $20K on legal fees, far less than the annual mold removal at the pool.

And you spineless spendthrifts did all this AFTER the AIG bailout and the Lehman Brothers bankruptcy.

Defend yourself instead of raising red herrings or running slick ads. You're on.

Anonymous said...

At least they didn't give $200k to the bus company!

Anonymous said...

That's chump change compared to the teacher's contract. By the time the contract expires we will be paying another $200K every pay period to the teachers. And you know it.

Anonymous said...

Wahat $200,000 to the bus company?

Anonymous said...

"At least they didn't give $200k to the bus company!"

Actually, they did.