New Hartford teachers, district negotiating contract
NEW HARTFORD - Rising healthcare costs are a primary concern as the New Hartford Central School District negotiates a new collective-bargaining contract with the district's teachers union.
The key issue is one many districts nationwide struggle with: Should teachers bear more of their own health coverage costs?
The school district picks up about 95 percent of teachers' healthcare costs under the previous contract, which expired in June but remains in effect until a new agreement is in place.
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<td>AT A GLANCE</td>
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<td>The New Hartford Teachers Association's contract signed in 2005 expired June 30. During negotiations, employees remain covered under the terms of the previous contract.
Health benefits and salary increases are part of the negotiations. School officials and union representatives would not discuss the details of negotiations.
Personnel costs including salary and health benefits make up 80 percent of the district's budget.
The school district picks up about 95 percent of the health care benefits for its employees. It also has a package for its retirees.
Annual salary hikes for the teachers under the expired contract is about 4 percent.
Source: New Hartford school officials</td>
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"A large portion of our budget is attributable to those," board President George Shaheen II said of health insurance expenses.
Personnel costs including salary and health benefits constitute about 80 percent of the school district's budget, school officials said.
The teachers deserve to be compensated for their hard work, said New Hartford Teachers' Association President James McNair.
"New Hartford is a community that values education and a district that attracts the best and the brightest in education," he said. "The faculty is dedicated."
The district and the union are talking about ways to lower healthcare costs such as increasing healthcare co-payments, Superintendent Daniel Gilligan said.
"Employees understand they have to pick up some of these costs," he said. "We have to find a perfect formula. That's what negotiations are all about."
Current contract negotiations also include salary hikes for teachers. Under the 2005 contract, the hike was about 4 percent annually, officials said.
Both sides are hopeful they can reach a deal, officials said. Neither district officials nor union representatives would discuss specific details of contract talks.
Common debate New Hartford is not alone in its struggle to find the proper balance of health insurance expenses and employee benefits.
Healthcare costs are rising by 10 percent to 12 percent nationwide, said Thomas Dorr, assistant superintendent of Oneida-Herkimer-Madison BOCES.
"It is a large portion of our budgets," he said. "It is very difficult to negotiate. It is not easy like private sector."
Private-sector firms tend to cover only about 80 percent of employees' health-care costs, according to a review of 2005 data by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality in Rockville, Md.
But healthcare contributions should be kept lower to compensate for salaries that tend to be below those paid for private sector employees, said Richard Iannuzzi, president of the New York State United Teachers, which represents all of the state's teachers and other school and university faculty and staff.
"A set of benefits other than salary makes the job worth taking and keeping," he said.
Utica City School District Board of Education member Victor Pellegrino agreed.
"We don't want to lose them ... We need them," he said about the teachers.
The Utica district also is negotiating a new teachers' contract.
"Health benefits are constantly going to be a subject of negotiations," Pellegrino said.
Community response Some New Hartford residents say rising healthcare costs for teachers are a burden taxpayers can't bear.
Town Planning Board member Jerome Donovan raised concerns at a 2004 public hearing about the premiums the school district pays for its staff and retirees.
"Since that time, the school district has done little or nothing to either be transparent about the process or shift some of the excess of the cost from the real property taxpayer," he said.
But former New Hartford teachers union President Annette Stratton said the fact that New Hartford is among the nation's top schools, which also pushes up property prices in the area, balances it out.
"I think when you consider that we are in the top 200 schools, my son is on scholarship … I think I got a great deal," she said.
Lorey Zaman, a former school board member, said she is concerned rising healthcare costs for teachers could hurt school programs.
"We can't afford it," she said. 'Long term we are going to suffer substantially."
Observer-Dispatch