Talks between Tacoma Public Schools and the union that represents its teachers were continuing this weekend, but as of Saturday night no significant progress on a new contract had been reported.
Meanwhile, the school district issued a news release announcing that Tacoma principals and the district’s top administrators had agreed to reduce what they spend on their own training, conference attendance and other professional development.
Their agreement was reached in July, Tacoma Principals Association President Dan Tharp later told The News Tribune.
Asked if the principals’ move was an attempt to persuade teachers to make a similar agreement for less training money, Tharp said: “I don’t think we are trying to send a message to teachers at all. We support our teachers. We are as anxious as anyone that we start school on time.”
When asked why the principals’ and administrators’ concession was announced Saturday instead of last month, district spokesman Dan Voelpel said: “This is intended to clarify how we are implementing state cuts throughout the organization.”
He also said it’s “very well-known that this issue also applies to the teachers” during contract negotiations.
Calls for comment from the teachers union were not immediately returned Saturday.
The district’s three-year contract with the Tacoma Education Association that represents more than 2,000 teachers, counselors and other school employees expires Wednesday. If there’s no contract agreement by then, union members must decide whether to work under their expired contract or whether to strike and delay the start of school, scheduled for Thursday.
Unresolved issues include how the school district will deal with a drop in state funding for teacher salaries, as well as a district request for larger class sizes to adjust for other state and federal funding reductions.
The Legislature this year cut state funding for teacher salaries by 1.9 percent, and for other school employees by 3 percent.
But the state doesn’t provide all funding for school employee salaries.
Tacoma officials say state dollars pay for about 46 percent of the district’s annual compensation for principals and assistant principals, and 71 percent of the cost of Tacoma teacher compensation. Local funds make up the rest, they say.
So a 3 percent cut in state salary funding works out to a 1.39 percent reduction in compensation for principals and administrators, district officials say.
Members of the principals association, which negotiates contracts for 86 principals and assistant principals, agreed in July to match the state cuts with cuts to their professional development funds. Similarly, top administrators in the district – including Superintendent Art Jarvis, Deputy Superintendent Carla Santorno and six other members of the district’s leadership team – agreed to cuts to their own training funds.
Each TPA member will have about $1,500 less to spend on professional development this year. For the top administrators, the cut averages about $1,650. Both had previously received $2,250 a year for training.
Tharp, the TPA president, said his members agreed to the cut as a way to deal with the state funding reduction.
“We are cognizant of wanting to protect jobs and programs that affect student achievement,” said Tharp, who is principal of Whittier Elementary School.
The school district also spends money on teacher professional development. Earlier this year, it estimated that paying teachers for seven training days, known as optional days, would cost an average of about $3,000 per teacher. With the number of teaching positions reduced by 47 this year, that figure could change.
The school district said in its news release Saturday that applying the state salary cuts to state-funded teacher compensation would cost an average of $860 a year per teacher in Tacoma.
But the teachers union has criticized the school district for protecting what it terms a budget surplus while seeking to cut teacher pay.
“Outgoing Superintendent Art Jarvis is sitting on a $45 million budget surplus,” states a TEA website. “Yet he is pushing to increase our kids’ class sizes, cut teacher pay and micromanage the way teachers teach.”
District officials say budget reserves are only about $39 million and that there are plans to spend $15.4 million in the coming school year, and another $7.6 million the year after, to soften the effects of other funding cuts.
Jarvis says the district this year also will address how to apply state cuts to other groups of employees.
Debbie Cafazzo: 253-597-8635
debbie.cafazzo@thenewstribune.com
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