School board silent on teachers’ contracts

By Andrea J. Cook, Journal Staff Writer | Friday, October 20, 2006

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RAPID CITY — More than 100 teachers filled the council chambers Thursday night at the City/School Administration Center, eager to see whether the Rapid City school board would declare contract negotiations at an impasse.

But the board ended a lengthy executive session in another room and did not have an answer for teachers who waited more than an hour to see what the board’s next step will be, an action at least one teacher said was cowardly.

“It was cowardly that they came out and did not have a statement,” Bart Popowski, a member of the Rapid City Education Association’s negotiations team, said.

Negotiations between the school board and the Rapid City Education Association stalled in early October. At that time, the board offered the teachers a 3 percent salary increase and advancement on the salary schedule for qualified teachers.

School board president Margie Rosario said that was the board’s last, best offer.

The board and the teacher’s association are also at odds over association leave, which is time off from work that the district has granted teachers and association leaders in the past. The association has traditionally picked up some of the costs associated with that leave time.

On Wednesday, Oct. 19, RCEA’s negotiations team met with the board’s attorney, Michael Hickey.

Hickey again repeated the board’s offer, according to Ron Riherd, chief spokesman for the negotiations team.

“He said, ‘The ball’s in your court,’” Riherd said, who added that Hickey said the team had 10 days to respond.

RCEA’s responded by rejecting the board’s offer.

A grassroots effort by teachers packed the council chambers for Thursday’s meeting, according to Nancy Kroeger and Sue Podoll, co-presidents of the education association.

“I think it was important to be here tonight to show unity and support for our negotiations team,” said Nadine Hill, a teacher at North Middle School.

Hill also came to protest the inequity of salaries between administrators and teachers who are “in the trenches everyday.

“All of us are here for the betterment of our kids,” Hill said. “We’re the ones in the classroom working with the kids; trying to give them the best advantage for a positive and good future seems like we’re always the last ones to be considered.”

Many of the teachers at the meeting were not association members, which was encouraging, Podoll said.

“We truly want to thank our membership and the teachers that took time out of their busy lives to come and support their leadership and their bargaining team,” she said. “That was spectacular.”

Rosario acknowledged the packed room but did not address negotiations during the meeting.

The board did, however, go into executive session about 6:15 p.m.

After more than an hour in executive session, the board did not return to the council chambers to adjourn but instead, adjourned in another room.

Superintendent of schools Peter Wharton and Rosario returned to the council chambers to announce that the meeting was over.

“There were no votes or any other decisions taken once we came out of executive session before we adjourned,” Rosario told the teachers when several asked what had happened.

When pressed, Wharton told negotiators that someone would be contacting them.

“We deserved to have at least some type of closure to what was happening tonight,” Nancy Kroeger, co-president of the Rapid City Education Association, said.

Contact Andrea Cook at 394-8423 or andrea.cook@rapidcityjournal.com