School Committee: November 25, 2024

Transcript captured from MHTV’s Vimeo auto-captioning. No speaker labels; proper names and dollar figures occasionally misheard. Click any timecode to jump to that moment in the source video.

0:14 Um, good afternoon. I’m Jen Schaffner, chair of Marblehead School Committee member of the Bargaining Subcommittee. I’m here with Sarah Fox, school Committee member and member of the Bargaining Subcommittee. Yesterday, the school committee bargaining subcommittee presented its best and final offer in mediation to the Marblehead Education Association, providing significant wage hikes for teachers and members of the other four bargaining units. We thought progress was being made over the weekend after face-to-Face meetings were initiated last week, late last week. However, the union seems intent on continuing its illegal strike at the expense of the children of Marblehead. In addition, the union’s tactics are now escalating to include harassment and bullying. The behavior of our striking teachers is setting a bad example for our children and is not the image Marblehead should be projecting

1:00 to the rest of the commonwealth. The superior Court made clear that the union and its top officials are in contempt of a court order, mandating that the teachers return to work. We hope the union decides to comply with that order so children can get back to school while we continue to negotiate final contracts. When mediation did not result in an agreement on Sunday evening, the court had ordered that the parties engage in fact finding, which is the next step in resolving impasses. This morning, representatives of the subcommittee and of the Marblehead Education Association met with the fact finder. However, the union did not agree to comply with the court ordered fact finding, and instead insisted that the fact finder serve as a mediator. He would be the fifth mediator to attempt to resolve the impasse. We will continue to comply with the court’s orders

1:47 and have indicated that we are available for fact finding. We have engaged in mediation for more than two weeks without resolution. Today the state appointed mediator canceled a scheduled 1:00 PM mediation session. Just so there’s no misunderstanding. We believe we have the best teachers on the North Shore and they are deserving of our respect and our support. But we also have an obligation to our students and to the residents of Marblehead to negotiate contracts that do not commit us to terms we cannot afford, and that do not force cuts in teaching staff and programs that would hurt our students and diminish the education we provide. Our current offer would require a reasonable override, which we unequivocally support. It is based on the current wage market and reflects the fiscal realities of our town.

2:34 The committee recently increased its original offer and would now raise the average salary of our teachers to more than a hundred thousand dollars and the top salary to $113,300. Over 184 working days, two thirds of our teachers would be at that top salary level, which surpasses the top wages agreed upon in Gloucester last Friday. Our proposals are also fair to our other employees. Paraprofessionals, custodians, maintenance personnel, bus drivers, tutors and permanent substitutes. We are offering our lunch and bus monitors, teacher’s aides, and other paraprofessionals who work part-time, a 48 to 69% salary and increase. As we recognize they play an important role in our schools. We initiated the proposal of moving our pre-kindergarten,

3:20 kindergarten special education and chemistry lab paraprofessionals to the tutor union with higher pay rates. As we feel that that reflects the important work they do every day with our students. We improved our original proposal to provide parental leave, offering a new benefit for the first 15 days of leave to be paid by the school committee and increase to 12 weeks the amount of additional time an employee could take to be covered by the employee’s accrued sick time. We have already added a sick leave bank for teachers and we have offered to create a new sick leave bank for the other employees, tutors, paraprofessionals, permanent subs and custodians. We also propose to repurpose time in the teacher’s workday to allow for the return of morning recess, and we have agreed to create a joint safety committee,

4:05 which were top priorities for the union. The committee’s proposal would cost $6.4 million by the end of the fourth year up from $4.8 million of our original offer and a 30% increase it would leave $3.174 million in a shortfall in our school budget by the end of year four, requiring a proposition two and a half override, that would add $334 and 60 cents to the average tax bill or necessitate cuts and layoffs. The union’s latest proposal has an $8 million price tag and would create $4.7 million as a whole in our town’s budget, which would need to be filled with a much larger override. If it failed, the cuts would be so great that the operation of the schools would be in jeopardy.

4:51 We simply can’t afford the union’s proposal or the risks that come with it. Our efforts to reach contract agreements began in December, 2023 when we first requested to start bargaining with the MEA long before their contract expired at the end of August. Unfortunately, the MEA waited until March of 24 to meet with us and then requested a slow paced twice, once or twice a month. Meeting schedule constricting the time calendar bargaining in the summer was not an option for the union at first when we first asked and only a couple of sessions or handful of sessions occurred over the summer, mostly dedicated to the our custodians who worked the full calendar year. Immediately before the strike began, the committee offered the 15 teachers on the MEA negotiating team paid days off

5:37 to stay at the table full time if the union canceled the strike so we could keep our students in school. That offer was rejected repeatedly by the union. Our goal is to retain our teachers and staff to maintain school class sizes, um, smaller than many other surrounding districts, and to continue to provide a work and school environment that’s beneficial to our students and employees. We pride ourselves on that and on our student, and that our students deserve the best education possible when teachers strike the burden stretches far beyond the walls of our schools. We wish it was simple, but in recent years it has become ugly. Cyber bullying and public pressure tactics. Upstage substantive dialogue facts are sacrificed to PR campaigns that misrepresent positions and actions.

6:22 In this case. It is also clear that the statewide Massachusetts Teachers Association is coordinating these strikes among three North Shore communities. The MTA seems intent on stretching these strikes out as long as possible to bring pressure on our communities and to send a warning shot to communities currently bargaining new contracts with their teachers and staff. Our children and families should not be used as pawns to advance the MTA statewide agenda. Thank you. A question from WBZ back here. Sorry, I probably can’t It’s okay. Can’t hear you. Um, Since the mediator canceled the one o’clock session, where does that leave you? Like we know in Beverly that the, the Beverly School Media has decided to stop bargaining in the meantime. Where are you at? So currently, um, the judge

7:10 overseeing the case for Marble Hedge. She’s also, um, overseeing the case for the other towns as well has ordered similar to Beverly that we move as of 6:00 PM yesterday to the process of fact finding. Um, so as of nine o’clock this morning, there was a meeting. We started the process of fact finding. Um, it’s unclear right now if the MEA will continue with that. They have stated to us as well as to the mediators that they will not engage. In fact, finding the last update I received, they also notified the fact finder that they are rejecting to engage in fact finding. They’ll speak to the, to the person assigned, um, in that role, but only in their capacity as a mediator,

7:56 which is not what the judge assigned to them. Right. So targeting or fact finding, you can’t be doing both at the same time? Uh, well, if we’re doing the fact finding, that is where we can only be in one place at a time. Okay. That’s where we are with our attorney. That’s where our representatives are during that time. Um, it would be impossible for us to be both in front of a fact finder and in front of a mediator in a different location. So Negotiations are on hold now hoping that teachers return to work. Even though a deal hasn’t been reached At any given time, we’ve made it very clear that if an updated proposal or a proposal that or or acceptance of our proposal were to come through, we immediately would prioritize that. Um, they have our contact information,

8:43 they have our attorney’s contact information, and around the clock we’re available for that callback. If it comes, it does not sadly come, But it could be like another week before the state mediator comes back with recommendations through the fact training process. So are you prepared to what keep schools closed through next week if they don’t return to Work? So I think I just, uh, make the point that we are not keeping schools closed. The teachers are on strike and they’re not in school. If the teachers want to come back to school, the doors are open, they can come back tomorrow. We ask them to come back and we will continue to negotiate with them through whatever means will work best for us. And we do have options from the state, the state mediator, and now the fact finder. And I think I would also point out furthermore,

9:30 that fact finding is bargaining. It is the next step in the bargaining is after mediation becomes fact finding. So we are still in that, in that process. And I’d also say that, you know, both Sarah and I and other members of our team, um, have had off the record conversations with teachers and with, if not with some members of their leadership team and and others, um, uh, on staff. And we’ve had very heart to heart conversations. And at any time any of us are willing to have a conversation and if we can make this happen, we, we will. I think the suspicion and the hope is that when one city, your town reached a deal, all three would kind of fall into place. How frustrating is it for you that that hasn’t happened? I am not surprised by where we are right now.

10:16 I think it was very strategic on the part of the MTA to have the union who did settle already settle first. I think they purposefully will settle the other two after. Um, it seems that they’re very focused on identifying certain individuals from various law practices and trying to shift the blame to them, um, when truly the one commonality of every strike around the state that has happened in recent history has been the MTA and that’s been the only commonality. Um, I think that what they’re, they did by settling Gloucester prior and holding out on the other two was very intentional. Is there any word or conversation about document hay from teachers?

11:01 Like did a Beverly Uh, I’m sorry, can you Repeat the question? Sure. Uh, is there any word about docking pay from teachers as we’re now doing directly over the strike? Any Word on that? Yeah. Is that a possibility at this point? Yes. So our understanding is, it’s been communicated to us is that it is against the law for a municipality to pay an employee who has not worked. And to take that a step further, the, um, chapter and section in mass general law that refers to this specifically notes it is illegal to play an employee who is engaged in an illegal strike. Uh, we had hoped quite honestly that we would be able to pay our employees in for short period of time. Were under the assumption that we could do that. Uh, it had been referred back to us that, uh,

11:48 the town actually had cannot legally cut checks to anybody who is engaging in an illegal strike. So we do have staff that has been coming to work that is, that are, would be represented by these units as well. They are still obviously getting paychecks, but there is no legal means for us to pay them during a strike according to mass general law. So Are they not getting a paycheck this week for the first time? Or when will that go into Effect? There are different pay cycles. Some of our employees are on weekly pay. They’ve already experienced this. Some are on bi-weekly pay. And those ones, um, will, will have that experience this week. This week. Yeah. Can you speak to, um, the fact that you guys are pursuing in court targeting four specific

12:35 individual teachers for, uh, in addition to the union? Um, and I’m wondering if you would consider, have you at all considered, a lot of the parents that we spoke to last night were saying that, that, that they would appreciate you guys would drop the investigation and, and and charges against those four individual teachers. And from what we’re hearing, that’s very like unprecedented.

12:58 So, um, I think there’s a lot of misinformation surrounding that. And in a little bit in your statement there, we filed with the Serb, who is the Commonwealth Employment Relations Board to issue an order to the four individuals to cease and desist with coordinating the strike, engaging in the strike and return back to work. Um, as they have been self-proclaimed leaders of this, the hope was by following that order from the Serb, which is not the courts, uh, that those teachers would return back to work and therefore we would be able to continue negotiations and mediation while having our students back into school. When they defied the order by the Serb, the Serb then files

13:48 with the court and invites the district to be a co-defendant. But the filing happens by the Serb. Um, we’ve heard things like lawsuits, restraining orders. That’s not what this is. We are seeking an order asking them to return to work, to call off the strike as the people who did call for the vote to call off the strike and return to work, what they do with that court order. Um, and in what comes from that is out of our hands in the hands of the judge. But it has been our hope all along that our staff will comply with court orders. So, but it is very unusual for, for a district to name specific teachers, uh, in these proceedings. So it’s Actually not, this has also happened in one

14:35 of the other districts where the union president was also named. Which one? Um, I believe that was in Beverly. Uh, Okay. That’s what I was indicated in this process. So, So it’s a timing piece. Mm-Hmm. Too, it’s a timing piece where our union took their vote and announced at four 30 on a holiday weekend, the MTA will receive service for the MEA and they would not receive service for individuals. Whereas the other towns, when they took their vote, they had time to issue service. ‘cause you want the order to say, go back to school, get the students back into school as soon as possible. It was a timing issue here because we were not able to give service

15:20 as Beverly did prior to individuals, because the MTA would not receive the service for those individuals. So we, that came later because our priority was and always has been, will continue to be getting our students back into school. So we needed to get those orders out as quickly as possible to the MEA, asking them to denounce the strike and to stop and go back to work. And once we returned back, our hope was sincerely that we wouldn’t have to take the next step. That usually is taken in the beginning. And because it went on so long, we, we had to finish what is typically done in that first stage. Could you also speak a little bit about why we’re having

16:07 a, the press conference here today? I heard there’s some safety concerns after last night. That’s correct. There were safety concerns. We were in the, we’ve been meeting in the public school, um, because we are the school committee for a public school. That’s where we’ve been mediating. It’s where our children go to school. And uh, we had, um, a very unfortunate incident last night where we were surrounded by members of the public. As we were trying to get to our car, we had to have a police escort to our car. Um, these were fellow tea, these were teachers, these were neighbors, these were community members, people I’ve known for many, many years. These were students and children. Um, and it was very unfortunate. So we thought for the safety of everyone, that it would be better to do this not in a public location.