After a five-hour negotiating session Tuesday night, there is still no deal between Marblehead’s teachers and the School Committee’s bargaining sub-committee. In a statement, the sub-committee wrote that the two sides remain “very far apart on wages.”
There was some progress to report, however.
“The sub-committee’s wage proposal for paraprofessionals included significant increases, including wage group adjustments that would result in up to 69% over three years increase for some,” according to a statement released by the sub-committee.
The statement continued, “The sub-committee has made significant movement however continues to be forced to balance the fiscal reality with the financial impact of all offers. With the anemic new growth in Marblehead’s revenue stream any increases will need to be funded either through an override or significant staff reductions.”
The Marblehead Education Association, which told the Current last week that it had lowered its wage demands, wrote to its members late Tuesday night letting them know there was still no agreement.
“Our latest wage proposal was designed to provide the committee the time to ensure that funding will be available for a four-year agreement, but the committee was unwilling to make a counterproposal tonight,” the MEA wrote. “The committee refused to accept a four-year agreement for any of the other units, preferring to keep us divided as much as possible.”
The MEA’s message continued, “Most insulting was the refusal to respond to our custodians. Despite the DLR (state Department of Labor relations) clearly ordering the committee to return to normal bargaining they would not present a modified wage proposal in their package presented tonight. Despite our better judgment, we chose to make a modified wage proposal in the hopes that the committee would respond in kind. We were completely disappointed to learn that when they returned from caucus they refused to counter once again.”
Other updates from the bargaining session:
- — The MEA says it agreed to change the job title of tutors to “instructional assistants” and proposed new language to provide job security to them, paraprofessionals and permanent substitutes.
- — The two sides moved closer to agreement regarding a school safety task force and professional days, according to the MEA.
The MEA encouraged all its members to attend the Oct. 17 School Committee meeting. The union has also started an email writing campaign and says it will “demand responses to those messages” by the School Committee at the Oct. 17 meeting.
The next bargaining session is set for Oct. 21 at the Village school auditorium. The sessions remain closed to the public.
Meanwhile,educators at rotating schools are staging work-to-rule actions, stopping all voluntary work.They are entering their schools in unison at the contractual start of their day and holding informational picket lines outside of schools.
The teachers have been working without a new contract since Aug. 31 and custodians since June 30.
