Since they have been told clapping is a disruption, the Battle Ground teachers wave in support of each other during the July 9 board meeting at the Lewisville Campus.
Little progress was made during a second round of contract negotiations between the Battle Ground Educators Association and the school district.
“We have gone down substantially from our first proposal to the district and they have come up minimally from what they first proposed,” said BGEA president Linda Peterson. “I left (July 10) feeling pretty disgruntled because I know there is money, I know that it’s meant for teachers and I know they worry about how they are going to cover other costs.”
Superintendent Mark Ross addressed those concerns when he shared his findings from the state administrators conference he attended at the end of June. He mentioned the state passing a bill to increase the average teaching salary to $64,000, but added that there are wrinkles in that security blanket to smooth.
“There are a lot of concerns for superintendents surrounding the McCleary decision because I think the intent of the legislature was to even out things, but what we are seeing is a lot of haves and have nots,” Ross stated to the public at the July 9 school board meeting. “We’ve heard of districts who are settling contracts all over the state, and those tend to be the districts that are the have districts. What we are not hearing about are the districts that have been running into, or will have, some perceived financial difficulty. So the question is, what sets these districts apart?”
According to Ross, three of those determining factors are staff mix, assessed value and the number of funded staff versus unfunded staff. In comparison with Battle Ground, Ross used the Lake Washington School District which provided its teachers a 15 percent salary increase.
Ross said Battle Ground has a much older staff than Lake Washington, and that means there is less money to go around to funded and unfunded educators. He added that Battle Ground has an assessed property value of $9.157 billion and a $34 million levy, while Lake Washington has a $57.35 billion assessed property value and a $67 million levy. And finally, Ross pointed out Battle Ground’s levy fund will drop to $20 million in a few years.
“Our current bill for unfunded staff and the money we put into our TRI (additional time, responsibility and incentive) is about $20 million, which is what our levy will be in two years, leaving no money for anything else than levy funds. Curriculum, sports, nurses, psychologists. All of that,” Ross said.
“As you can see, there are districts that gained from this McCleary decision and districts that are struggling to figure it out,” he added. “I was not alone in the room. There were over 100 superintendents and we were all trying to figure the have and have nots.”
Peterson understands Ross’ concerns, but she knows teachers have made sacrifices to keep the district afloat in the face of failed bonds and lost money on levies for years.
“We have teachers who love teaching in Battle Ground. They have been here for years, they are attached to the families and they have been loyal,” Peterson said. “I brought up our levy failure seven or eight years ago. The teachers gave up pay to keep our district going. I find it absurd that kind of commitment and loyalty is expected of us again.”
Peterson has watched Battle Ground teachers strike out at the bargaining table the last three years. She said it’s getting harder for her to convince loyal teachers to stay in Battle Ground when neighboring districts are offering more pay.
“If you can get a job in another district where you make more $10,000 a year, there’s no reason not to go,” Peterson explained. “You don’t have to sacrifice because you are going to love those children just as much as you love the children in your classroom right now.”
The next bargaining session is scheduled for Wednesday, Aug. 1. Several school districts in Clark County are going back to the negotiating table, along with Battle Ground. Peterson said teachers could vote to strike if a settlement is not reached by the next coordinated bargaining session Wednesday, Aug. 8.
