North Harrison teachers will once again gather en masse in the lobby of the High School tomorrow afternoon to support their teacher bargaining team. The gathering will begin at 4 P.M. outside the library, where the contract talks take place. The North Harrison Classroom Teachers Association (NHCTA), who represents the teachers in bargaining, has been at the bargaining table since July of 2004.
Forms put out by the Indiana Department of Education (IDOE) Division of Finance show the school corporation to have some $8.1 million dollars in unobligated cash; some in the General Fund, the rest in a Rainy Day Fund.
The Corporation also obtained $2.7 million from the state of Indiana in 2005, promising to convert its costly teacher early retirement program into a defined benefit plan. This change would save the school corporation large amounts of money as baby-boomers approach retirement age. That money sits in a bank account as well. Years ago a deal was struck between the NHCTA and the Board but the Board’s attorney would not accept the package unless it was authored by him so the deal fell through.
Teachers’ contract proposals have been conservative. At the last session with the Board, the NHCTA agreed to take four years without any raise, then a 2% and 3% in 2008-2009 and 2009-2010. “They wouldn’t accept that”, said NHCTA President, Dan Haskell. “They pushed us to take five years at 0% because Board President Gary Byrne was ‘worried about health insurance costs’ in 2010”, Haskell explained. “The cost of our six-year package was less a half million dollars and they’ve got 8 million plus sitting in bank accounts.”
The NHCTA has requested that the School Board bring some specific information to the meeting on Wednesday night. An email request for this information was sent to the Interim Superintendent, Randy Barrett, last Sunday evening. The NHCTA requested that the Board bring the current balances for the General Fund and the Rainy Day Fund, as well as all the expenditures from those funds since July 1, 2009. “We’ve also asked them to bring all their bank accounts and balances to the meeting”, added Haskell.
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