The Herald, Sharon, Pa.

Local News

July 2, 2009

UPDATE: Months after approval, contract signed

By Joe Pinchot

HERMITAGE — Back on Sept. 15, Hermitage School Board approved a teachers contract that already had been ratified by the Hermitage Education Association.

Typically, contracts are signed shortly after they are approved by both sides.

This wasn’t a typical case.

The contract was signed Tuesday, the day before it was to go into effect.

The length of time between approval and signing seems even more perplexing given that it was an early bird contract. The sides agreed to focus on small number of issues and keep mostly in tact the previous contract. The bargaining sessions lasted about three months.

“It took longer to get it copied than it did to get it approved,” said Superintendent Karen A. Ionta.

HEA President Kathie Sherman, whose term recently ended, but who signed the contract on behalf of the union, declined to comment.

Once the basic pact was approved by both sides, representatives went back over the agreement to make sure the language was written as they expected, each negotiated provision was added and the numbers were correct, Mrs. Ionta said.

As mistakes were found — including some of the numbers — the contract had to be returned for review, she said.

The delay seemed to derive from the Pennsylvania State Education Association representative being “extremely, extremely busy,” she said. In the absence of state union help, the local union had to take care of the details.

“Poor Tim Jones, he pretty much did the whole thing,” Mrs. Ionta said of the local union’s chief negotiator, Timothy M. Jones.

The five-year contract grants the 150 union members 3è-percent pay hikes each year. The starting salary for someone with just a bachelor’s degree is set at $41,508 for the coming school year, and rises to $46,998 in 2013-14.

The top salary, master’s degree plus 60 hours of additional course work, rises from $70,414 this year to $79,170 in the last year.

The contract also:

ä Increases union members’ health insurance premium shares from $30 a month in the first year to $60 a month in the last year. Premium-sharing was instituted in the previous contract, starting at $10 a month in 2005 and rising to $25 a month this year.

ä Reduces the number of members on the Academic Advisory Council, which recommends solutions to district “educational problems” from 20 teachers to 10, with half of the council picked by the union and the other half by the superintendent.

ä Refines the scheduling parameters of staff meetings and teacher planning periods.

ä Gives sixth-grade teachers the same limits on classroom preparation days — four a semester — as teachers of grades seven through 12.

ä Extends paid bereavement leave for the funerals of first cousins, aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews.

ä Requires that retirement, early retirement and unused sick day payments be made to a retirement plan, and not in cash.

ä Changes the tuition reimbursement formula from up to $200 a credit to 70 percent of the cost of a credit, and requires that courses be taken at a college within the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education.

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