Furlough Update #5

REA and OSEA met with the District again on Thursday, August 7, to work on the Furlough MOU. 

To begin, the District provided a counter to our proposal. Below are the highlights.
Proposed Days

• They conceded an additional student contact day in October to take place of the proposed paid holiday on 9/1 (for a total of 6 student contact days). This is still not ideal, as October is too early in the year to get the furlough day back.
• The four remaining furlough days remained three paid holidays and one planning day.
• They objected to language around seeking a waiver for student seat time and continued to seem reluctant to reach out to the State, instead forcing REA and OSEA members to bear the brunt of State/District budgeting woes.
  
  

Restoration of Unpaid Furlough Days

• The District replaced language giving us sole discretion to determine the order furlough days are restored with language requiring the District to be part of the decision making process with REA and OSEA “input.”

Trigger Language

• The District  returned to numbers that inflate the cost of a school day, making it difficult to impossible to get those days back.
• The District continued to insist we use the State School Fund Estimate that is over $700,000 more than they budgeted for. This would create a still greater hurdle of additional revenue before days could be returned. 
  
  

Protecting Members from RIF

• Rather than confer with the Associations if an unforeseen event forced the District to make sudden  decisions involving RIF, the District sought to limit our involvement to events related to the State School Fund. This would limit our ability to protect members from RIF.

Rather than  respond with a counter, we returned with clarifications and a request for information.
Concerns

• We made it clear that agreeing to 10 days we previously offered was contingent on the District pursuing a waiver and opting to use student contact days first before relying on paid holidays. 
• Our trigger language actually granted them a reasonable buffer for unforeseen costs and charter school payments, yet they continue to look for unreasonably high trigger language thresholds.
  
  

Information Requests

• We shared our concern that the District’s accounting of finances are inconsistent, with different numbers found on their website than in the board book, and even different numbers cited in bargaining sessions. Therefore, we asked for updated and more consistent information, including the following:
  • Any and all costing worksheets the District used to determine calculations leading to 10 furlough days.
  • Up to date Admin and confidential salaries and compensation (this year and last).
  • Up to date salaries and compensation for classified and certified staff.
  • The amount saved due to RIF.
  • Number of people currently working in the District.
  • Dollar amount for student vs. non-student day.
    
    

The District responded by essentially refusing to provide additional information, asserting that they either already had provided it or it appears elsewhere and we can find it ourselves. 
​
Our team also pointed out that the cost roll-up (insurance, benefits etc.) the District was using to determine the cost of an employee seemed high compared to other districts in the state. This could potentially mean the original budget was made around exaggerated numbers. The District did agree to get back to us with their costing for these roll-ups.
OSEA/REA Counter
Finally, the District all but demanded we give them a counter that day. Because it was still early, we agreed to return with a counter that was essentially our previous language, with a few minor changes that fell outside the days and trigger language. 
Moving Forward
We are scheduled to meet again Friday, August 15, hopefully with clearer information.
We realize the hardships around not knowing what our schedule will look like for next year, but we do not feel comfortable giving back our member’s hard-won gains for a “crisis” that the District has yet to convincingly prove, using a process that leaves most of the burden on the backs of the two Associations. We continue to remind the District that it is not just us, but our members, who will vote on furlough days. That their refusal to provide clear and consistent information makes it difficult for us to tentatively agree on an MOU that we believe members will vote “yes” to approve.

In the end, whatever we agree to at the table is up to you to ratify or reject.