Briefing Book: Freeze or we’ll fire!

Written by J. D. Piro
Thursday, 21 January 2010 11:09

“The hard truth is that the contract we negotiated in good faith has become impossible to afford” — school board President Michael Gordon, in a letter to Teacher’s Union President Sandy Grebinar, dated Jan. 15, 2010.

Take one school district presentation on an impending budget crisis. Add an article from The Lewisboro Ledger on how higher school taxes depress home values. Stir in a large dose of the worst economy in decades. What do you get?

If you are school board President Michael Gordon, you get to send a letter to Sandy Grebinar, president of the Katonah-Lewisboro School District Teachers’ Union, asking that the teachers’ union give back, at least temporarily, the wage gains they won in their most recent contract negotiations. Mr. Gordon sent his letter to Ms. Grebinar less than 24 hours after the school board unanimously voted to endorse the wage freeze in order to avoid, in the school board’s words, “a severe loss” in teacher jobs.

Last month, Assistant Superintendent for Business Michael Jumper presented a grim illustration of the dilemma facing the school district in the upcoming 2011 budget. Noting that school district salaries and benefits represent more than 80% of the district’s current $108-million school budget, Mr. Jumper projected that salaries and benefits would jump roughly 6% and 11% next year, creating a projected 2011 budget of close to $114 million.

The school board recognizes that, in this economy, taxpayers are likely to vote down that kind of budget and tax increase. In that event, the school board might have to implement what’s called a “contingency budget.” How much is a contingency budget, you ask? At the risk of oversimplifying, you take the current $108-million budget and increase it by 4% or, if less, the rate of inflation.

We’ll do the math for you — last year’s rate of inflation was 0%, so the increase in last year’s $108-million budget would be 0%. That means the contingency budget for 2011 would be $108 million. And the layoffs would begin — lots of them.

“The stark reality,” Mr. Gordon wrote to Ms. Grebinar, is that the school board, if it adopts a contingency budget, “likely would need to reduce faculty and staff by more than 55 positions — most of those teaching positions.” Even a budget increase of 2% or 3% would result in elimination of between 25 and 30 teaching positions, notes Mr. Gordon.

Mr. Gordon gives a hat-tip to The Lewisboro Ledger for its article “Taxes depress home values” by Jane Dove. “It would be irresponsible,” Mr. Gordon writes to Ms. Grebinar, “for us to allow events to unfold passively in a way that would further exacerbate that situation.”

Noting the $2.1-million increase in contributions to the Teachers’ Retirement System and the magnitude of the recession, Mr. Gordon tells the teachers’ union president: “Had those circumstances been known, the Board would not have agreed to salary terms that could cost the District another $2.1 million ... resulting in salary increases for more than half of our faculty in the range of 6.5% to 9.9%.”

So what’s Plan B? What if Ms. Grebinar refuses Mr. Gordon’s offer? What if she won’t give up the deal that was won fair and square at the bargaining table?

Unlike Ms. Grebinar, Mr. Gordon returns phone calls from The Ledger.

“We would do our best to minimize a reduction in staff positions,” Mr. Gordon told Briefing Book, “but I don’t see how that gets avoided. With everything the district is going through, I don’t see us getting a 5.4% budget increase past the voters, especially given the declining revenue from Albany. I don’t think we would put that in front of the voters. We would be as creative as we can. But there would have to be staff reductions.”

Not since Peter DeLucia voted “no” on last year’s town tax increase has a Lewisboro politician set forth as clear a case for change as Mr. Gordon has. Declining home values, higher taxes, and an angry electorate created last year’s taxpayer revolt at the ballot box. The school board is making a valiant effort to avoid the same fate.

The school district’s budget problems are systemic and long term. They won’t be solved simply by freezing teacher salaries for a year. That stopgap measure, taken alone, will only postpone the inevitable increases by back-loading them onto future budgets and future taxpayers.

But given where we are, Ms. Grebinar would be wise to take Mr. Gordon’s offer. It’s not the final answer. But it’s an essential, and welcome, first step.