Conflicts dot Monadnock warrant Budget, contracts, 6th-graders' move up for discussion Saturday

SWANZEY CENTER - Contracts for teachers and support staff, along with a proposed budget of nearly $32 million, will be up for discussion Saturday at the Monadnock Regional School District's official-ballot first session.

First on the agenda is a budget of $31,852,333 proposed by the budget committee, which is less than the $32,098,502 the school board had requested.

The $31,852,333 is 3 percent more than this year's budget of $30,935,825, a default budget that kicked in after voters rejected the proposed budget last March.

A total of $1,259,681 is proposed for the district's share of the $1,842,413 N.H. School Administrative Unit 38 budget. This is 7.3 percent higher than the $1,173,886 voters approved last year.

Also on the warrant is a four-year contract with teachers that would gradually increase the share teachers are paying of their health insurance and phase out the controversial benefit of early retirement, which enables veteran teachers to retire while receiving a portion of their salaries for the next seven years.

If the contract passes, taxpayers will still have to pay a total of $2,207,465 in benefits through 2015-16, when the district's obligation to those already on early retirement will end, according to information provided by Unit 38 officials.

But a lawsuit pending in Cheshire County Superior Court, brought forward by Sullivan selectmen, said early retirement should stop immediately since, it alleges, its full cost was never legally warned to district voters in the first place.

If voters approve the teachers contract, it would be the first such vote in several years. In 2006, voters rejected a teachers contract at the polls. And last year, the school board and teachers union failed to negotiate a contract in time for it to make it on the ballot.

The contract article lists $680,306 for increases in wage and benefits in the first year, $996,606 for the second year - which represents a $316,300 increase over the first year's increase of $680,306 - $1,407,670 for the third year and $1,853,924 for the final year of the contract, according to Unit 38 Business Manager Katherine E.L. Chambers.

The warrant also carries an article for a three-year contract with support staff, which also gradually increases the amount those employees contribute to their health insurance. Taxpayers have nixed contracts for support staff during the school district's last two elections.

Increases for wages and benefits are listed as $323,139 for the first year of the contract, $580,639 for the second year - which represents a $257,500 increase over the previous year's increase of $323,139 - and $732,738 in the final year of the contract.

Both the teachers and support staff contracts include wage increases to bring employees back up to the pay steps called for in the district's pay schedule. This would make their salaries correspond with their experience, since raises have been frozen for the years without voter-approved contracts.

Voters will also weigh in on a petitioned article asking whether taxpayers wish to disband the district's budget committee.

One of the 60 people who signed the petition is budget committee member Jennifer Gomarlo of Swanzey. Among reasons she listed was that the committee seems redundant to the school board's finance committee and that it's difficult to find enough people interested in filling the committee's 15 seats.

Last on the warrant is a petitioned article asking whether 6th-grade students should be moved from elementary schools to the middle/high school building in Swanzey Center.