Ridgewood Board of Ed Statement:
The Board of Education is committed to settling the contract with the Ridgewood Education Association (REA). To this end, the full Board will meet with the state-appointed super conciliator on July 20 at 5 p.m. at the Education Center, 49 Cottage Place.
The REA negotiating team will also be present that evening. The Board is unanimously steadfast in its desire to resolve the on-going impasse with the REA and is prepared to stay as long as needed to finalize the settlement and reach agreement on a successor contract to the one that expired on June 30, 2015. The Board fervently hopes that the 2016-17 school year will start with a new contract and put an end to the difficulties that this impasse has caused. When the Board’s negotiating team first met with the super conciliator on June 27, the team presented a threeyear contract proposal that included a salary increase for each of the three years of 1.1%, 2.8% and 2.8%, with additional one-time payments for the highest paid teachers to defray part of the increased costs for their healthcare premiums. The average salaries for Ridgewood’s teachers are currently near the top when compared to salaries in other Bergen County school districts. Our starting salaries for teachers are at the top. If the REA were to accept the Board’s proposal, our teachers would continue to maintain that comparative advantage. The Board’s proposal includes a change to the health benefit plan from NJ Direct 10 to NJ Direct 15. Both plans offer the same provider network. With NJ Direct 15 there would be a nominal increase in copays for primary care doctors and specialists. The copay would increase from $10 to $15. A change in the health insurance plan would lower premium costs for both the district and the staff. The Board’s proposal would fairly compensate our teachers and secretaries for the excellent work they do. To date, in every negotiation session the Board’s team has delineated the economic impact of the proposals discussed.
The team has been forthright in its discussions with the REA, the mediator, the fact-finder, and the super conciliator that the cost of the contract must be affordable and aligned with the district’s financial realities, which include a two percent limit on tax increases. The Board remains hopeful that a settlement can be reached that addresses the needs articulated by our teachers and secretaries but does not set the stage for drastic cuts to staff and programs nor jeopardize the district’s financial future.
REA statement :
“Once again tonight the BOE has refused to accept the report from the impartial State Appointed Fact Finder. In fact the Board has not improved its position since February, and tonight presented nothing new to the REA negotiating team.The BOE continues in its position that it cannot afford the Fact Finder report. The impartial Fact Finder examined the Board’s books when he made his recommendation. Despite the BOE’s false statements, the report shows it has the resources to fund the recommended settlement. If the BOE cuts programs, it will not be because of the REA. Instead the Board is using scare tactics and the threat of cutting programs as an attempt to scapegoat the REA. This is no time for divisiveness; instead it is time for compromise. But as long as the Board remains set in their discredited “cost neutral” position, until it is willing to truly negotiate, this impasse will not end.
This meeting was the last chance of a settlement before September. Its failure to negotiate tonight means that teachers and secretaries will return to work beginning their second year under an expired contract. In addition, the Ridgewood Administrators Association (RAA) contract has also expired. The recalcitrance of the Board now means that in addition to teachers and secretaries, every principal, assistant principal, and supervisor will also begin September under an expired contract. This should not be acceptable in Ridgewood.
The Board needs to stop posturing and begin the work of negotiating in good faith to settle this contract. The BOE obviously, as stated in its email to the school community, is NOT “prepared to stay as long as needed to finalize the settlement and reach an agreement on a successor contract”.
I assume the contract will be settled when the teachers learn what a 2% cap means.
Maybe a summer remedial math program.
STAND TOUGH BOE !!!
The REA and the full time NJEA labor lawyers behind the curtain are not negotiating in good faith with our volunteer BOE to settle this contract. Their posturing over annual wage increases above the 2% property tax cap, in addition to the step wage schedule, as well as $15 health care co-pays instead of $10 is not acceptable to Ridgewood tax payers and should not be acceptable in these protracted contract negotiations.
BOE must hold the line,time to welcome teachers into todays world. Say NO to the teachers and there union.
Ha, Ha – you’ve done it now 1:23pm… the compassionate teachers and their supporters will savage you for your typo.
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There (sic) gonna git U !!
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Thank you BOE
My greatest fear is the Board is reading these comments that are so uneducated, uninformed, and ignorant, and they may be foolish enough to think you represent the residents of Ridgewood. As a taxpayer, I am very much in support of the teachers receiving a fair contract. This board is wasting time and money which is harmful to all of you. This won’t happen, and is futile to even suggest, but you all should really make even a small attempt to get your facts straight before offering up so many opinions. This blog is an embarrassment to Ridgewood.
11:50 If you were following any of the debate you would know that the REA request and subsequent recommendation by the non partisan negotiator show there is money in the budget without going above the 2% cap. You would also know that the cap is not an absolute and has conditions that allow a waiver; one condition being the overrun costs for health benefits.
Teachers are not looking to increase the taxes but re appropriate budget expenditures within the current budget.
Taxpayers should be asking what the BOE is spending all of the money on if they can’t budget enough to settle this contract. Is a one-to-one Chrome Book initiative for all the high school and middle school students in the district a necessity? The high school students? maybe…but not the middle school students.
Stay strong BOE. the last 3 comments are typical of the teachers who refuse to realize they have a pretty good deal working in Ridgewood’s School System. At this point, if they don’t like what is being offered, they should resign. Picket line? We can and would like to replace you if it comes to that.
Thank you BOE. We pay over $40 in co-pays now. The meager $10 to $15 is fair…too fair if you ask me! The teachers and civil servants are not in touch with reality. I think I had $20 co-pays 20 years ago. NoBama care is what they should be on with 401Ks. Wake up America. Dumont just retired their Police Chief too…a $257,000 payout. Page L-3 in the Record Rag. It’s called UNSUSTAINABLE, how many more can we pile on before it collapses? Work 25 years and then live in retirement 35 plus years or more. Private sector works to 65, 67, 69 or 70 depending on what the Gov’t moves us to.
Madeline, can you state which facts are not straight? In this specific post, there are statements by the BoE and REA, which seems fair. Not sure why TRB is an embarrassment when I drive past RHS and see the teachers dressed in red outside while our children stream past them. Not very professional for 6-figure professionals.
Thank you 2:55, 2:57 and 3:13. I figured you would show up. Were you at the beach or were you waiting for the teachers union to approve the wording?
3:13 – did your kid graduate from middle school?
“As a taxpayer, I am very much in support of the teachers receiving a fair contract.”
So then you are for the teachers paying a higher co-pay for their top tier medical benefits, correct?
It’s the arrogance and self righteous entitlement of the teachers that really makes me unsympathetic to their position.
Thank you BOE. We are all behind you. Stay strong.
@2:55, I highly doubt the BOE is looking to the blog for guidance. HOWEVER, this blog has been pretty on the money as it relates to Ridgewood sentiment having predicted recent council elections and referendum votes correctly. Perhaps the BOE SHOULD be reading here? Furthermore, if you look at the Ridgewood Moms and DADs facebook page, most posts about the REA are met with silence. Why do you think that is? Lastly, the losing council candidates had probably 10x as many visible signs as the support the Ridgewood teachers sign. What does THAT tell you?
@2:57, I watched the budget presentation. What are you proposing be cut to fit the increases? technology and floor cleaning?
@3:13, you are right, our budget is bloated. What else can we cut?
Time to stand firm against the union. Retirement and insurance benefits that look more like those of the people that pay teachers salaries. It’s a buyers’ market for labor out there.
You know what’s embarrassing? How about RPS’ not to spending money on the Class of 2016’s diploma covers and telling parents to do it themselves. For all of the fees senior parents pay, you would have thought RPS would have factored this in somehow. . This years diplomas were handed out without the previously given (as in free, part of the Tradition of Excellence) engraved padded maroon covers.. Parents noticed because today, a blank email was sent out with an attached advertisement from a private vendor for the covers ($12 + shipping). The ad notes “many of you have expressed an interest on what do do with their diploma now. We offer a few great options . . . ) Not a word from RPS about why the covers were cut; nope, just an advertisement telling parents to buy them for themselves if they want them. Was the money cut or could it be that this fell through the cracks because teachers and secretaries were running into RHS at the last minute or that the distribution would have been an “extras”? In any case, what a shame.
I think it is time for the parents to speak up. Clearly there are many of us that feel the teachers have been handed a pretty sweet deal over the years. Why should they be entitled to anything more than the rest of us deserve? Just because they look after our children? The fact that they are only required to actually teach them 23 hours a week blows my mind. We have tried to speak on social media, but when we do we are shot down. We try to speak anonymously but again we are attacked. The lack of signs that around town show how little support the teachers are getting. I think at the next BOE meeting we need to show ourselves in numbers. We need to speak and let our voices be heard. We need to show them that there are fewer supporters for the teachers than they they think. It is time for the bullying by the teachers and union end and we take a stand and support our children and the BOE. The fact is that the teachers are complaining that morale is low. Just by signing a contract is not going to change anything. You have lost the respect of many of the parents in this town and the example you are setting is not the one I want to have my children live by. I think that many of us would gladly welcome new blood. As teachers I thought you would support your peers. The attitude you have is there is none better than you. Remember you were young once too. Don’t take your job for granted!
2:57 said, “Teachers are not looking to increase the taxes but re appropriate budget expenditures within the current budget.” That’s Union malarkey for, “More wages and benefits for US, less of the $102 million for students and investing in our schools to make sure our students can get the best education possible.” This is called “bad faith” negotiating.
We can’t speak because our children would likely by personally targeted by Yannone and the REA. It is despicable what the REA is doing. Last year teachers at the high school turned out the lights at 3:14 on kids coming for extra help during period 9. They also had their coats on 3:12 just to make sure they didn’t spend an “extra” minute in the building. Several overnight field trips including those associated with special honors programs and sold as part of the curriculum were cancelled in a capricious and arbitrary manner, and despite the strenuous efforts of the classroom teachers to hold the trips. Of course this year we won’t have to worry about that since we have been told that ALL clubs and field trips will be cancelled. I imagine this will start to more directly impact the younger kids this year. Hard to feel sympathetic for the teachers and their fight against the $5 copay bump. But having seen how they operated last year – there is no way I would speak publically at a board meeting. The REA, in my opinion, would not hesitate to harass students that are children of complainers.
And @ 6:14, the rea and boe both concede teachers are paid extra for those activities so the only reason they are being canceled is because that teacher has chosen to cancel, not because they aren’t being compensated extra for that activity.
Agree w Ann, the REA must have copies of ‘Rules for Radicals’ in the reference section at their offices. They have targeted our kids through indoctrination and intimidation. Hold the line, BOE – these “professionals” are acting like petulant children.