Sag Harbor School District asks entire staff to consider pay freeze

Facing a tax increase that they fear voters will not support given the lean economic times, the Sag Harbor School District is asking its employees to accept a pay freeze for the 2010-11 school year to ease the burden of the budget on taxpayers.

The district’s two schools were gripped with anxiety late last week after administrators told several faculty and staff that their jobs might be on the line if the school budget fails at the polls in May and the district is forced to adopt a substantially reduced “contingency” budget under state guidelines. After drawing up a contingency budget plan with Superintendent Dr. John Gratto, the administrators of both buildings late last week began informing those employees who face elimination.

Salaries account for about 60 percent of the district’s $30.5 million proposed budget.

Representatives of the district’s five labor unions met with Dr. Gratto last week, and the superintendent appealed personally to all of the district’s employees, in an e-mail to the entire staff and in two open forums at the schools on Friday, to consider a pay freeze. In his message, he warned that if voters do not approve the proposed budget, significant program cuts and layoffs would be necessary under the state-mandated restrictions that would force the district to cut an additional $1.3 million from the budget.

“The administrators and I have prepared a list of potential program reductions and layoffs if a contingency budget is adopted,” Dr. Gratto told employees.

“In the meantime, we have asked union presidents of the administrators, teachers, custodians, secretaries and teaching assistants unions to consider asking their members to take a pay freeze,” his e-mail to the staff reads. “Doing so would reduce the budget by about $1,200,000 and, therefore, greatly increase the chances of this budget passing.”

The pay freeze would cut about 5 percent from the expected tax rate increase and Dr. Gratto said on Tuesday that he thinks the goodwill engendered by the sacrifice would win over voters and make it likely that the budget would pass. Dr. Gratto said he is willing to forgo his own salary increase for next year.

In the last month, administrators and the Sag Harbor School Board have cut nearly $2 million from the $32.6 million first draft of the budget, reducing the potential tax increase from more than 16 percent to just under 10 percent. But some board members have said that they’re worried that in hard economic times, the typically supportive Sag Harbor electorate will not stand for such a large tax hike.

Dr. Gratto said he would like to have an answer on the possibility of a pay freeze before the board adopts its final budget on April 12.

Teachers Association of Sag Harbor President Eileen Kochanasz said she does not understand why the question of a pay freeze can’t be left unanswered until after district voters cast their ballots on the budget. If the budget were to fail at the polls, the district would be allowed to put it up for a second vote, presumably with cuts. If it failed a second time, the district would be forced to adopt a contingency budget, which would automatically become the budget for the coming school year.

“Dr. Gratto told me that if the employees agree to the freeze, he would recommend they go straight to a contingency budget,” Ms. Kochanasz said. “My initial response is, I’m not sure why they are asking for this when they have not even put out a budget for approval yet.”

Ms. Kochanasz, like several parents have at board meetings, noted that Sag Harbor residents have traditionally supported the school’s spending proposals, even when they meant tax increases. Board members have pointed out that the district has not had such a large tax hike in recent years and that the lingering effects of last year’s recession have many residents in dire financial straits.

With the recession at full boil last year, the School Board received much criticism from some members of the community for its 4.5-percent tax increase. But the budget was overwhelmingly approved by voters. A $6.7 million bond proposal to make structural repairs to the school buildings, however, was defeated at the polls in December by a broad margin.

The School Board and Dr. Gratto have been deadlocked in an increasingly combative standoff with the district’s teachers union over contract negotiations, rooted largely in the district’s refusal to adhere to traditional contractual salaries and health benefits because they say they will lead to out of control spending increases in the next 10 years. At recent board meetings, parents have, for the first time, implored the teachers to back down from their salary demands in light of the slumping economy.

Ms. Kochanasz said she fears the dragged out contract battle—the teachers’ contract expired nearly two years ago—and now the pay freeze proposal and threats of layoffs will send some of Sag Harbor’s teachers in search of jobs elsewhere.

“Everyone is very distressed with the uncertainty,” she said. “People are going to start looking for other jobs now. These are fabulous teachers the principals in both buildings worked a long time to bring together. If we lose them, the district is going to start to fall apart.”