Little Rock School District leaders are proposing an abbreviated, five-page successor agreement to the current 93-page teacher contract in the state's largest school district.
That existing teacher contract -- negotiated for the 2012-15 school years between the district and the Little Rock Education Association union -- expires Oct. 31.
Baker Kurrus, superintendent of the state-controlled district, posted the proposed contract on the district's website Monday, the first day most teachers reported to work for the 2015-16 school year.
Students will start classes Monday.
Kurrus said the proposed contract is much shorter and general than the existing one.
"It recognizes the union and says we will negotiate wages and benefits, and we'll work out conditions of employment," he said. "It does have a grievance procedure in there."
Kurrus said the draft is not a final document, and it is the subject of ongoing discussions with Cathy Koehler, the elected president of the employees association, and other association leaders.
"We're obligated under our existing contract to negotiate in good faith, and that's what I intend to do," Kurrus said.
The association has scheduled a membership meeting for 5 p.m. today at the Arkansas Education Association building, 1500 W. Fourth St. in Little Rock, on the matter of a successor contract. That meeting of the private organization will be closed to the public.
"We're going to give the members all the information that they don't know about," Koehler said. "It's a proposal. It's a working document. We've already been working on items in our office. Obviously, with the blanks in the draft, you can tell we've got to negotiate some of what is even in there."
Koehler said the process to arrive at a new contract is different from what was used in the past, when teams representing both sides exchanged proposals and signed off on tentative agreements to be approved later by union members and School Board members. Employees would lobby the School Board for support of the tentative agreements.
The state dismissed the locally elected School Board in January as part of the takeover, and Education Commissioner Johnny Key now serves as the district's board.
"It's not the way we've always done it, but that does not mean we are not having conversations. We are," Koehler said. "We aren't doing it in the formal process we've used in the past. Our focus is still on starting school next Monday and focusing on students."
Kurrus, who became the district's state-appointed superintendent in May, said he notified teacher leaders earlier this summer about his contract preferences.
"I talked to them about it in June and said this is the direction I would like to go in," he said. "We're just going to negotiate in good faith. I have a lot of confidence in LREA and Cathy Koehler and her team. We're working together really well. I value teachers. We've got some challenges, so this is something we have to do. But we really value teachers. I'm very optimistic about our ability to get along and work well with our teaching staff."
Kurrus said "simplifying the relationship" between the association and the district is about "making our expenditures line up to our income."
The district, which has an annual budget of more than $300 million, is facing the loss of about $37 million a year in state desegregation aid after the 2017-18 school year. The payment from that last year must be spent on construction, not on operating costs such as salaries.
Kurrus said the district must spend its revenue for the purposes envisioned by the state in allocating the money.
"We need to move toward the state standards," he said of spending. "That is what we'll have to do to be sustainable long-term -- move toward the state standards in regard to everything that is financial."
He said existing state law and rules establish many of the working conditions for school employees, such as grievance procedures and leave time.
Salary schedules and teacher planning time are already in place for the new school year under the existing contract, Kurrus and Koehler both said.
The Facebook page Our Community, Our Schools -- operated by district parents Jim Ross and Barclay Key -- publicized the district's draft proposal in a Sunday afternoon posting, saying the "LRSD will be pulling the negotiated agreement that has been in place in our city for the last 50 years. "
The Arkansas Times reported on the Our Community, Our Schools posting on its blog Sunday.
Ross was a member of the School Board when the state Board of Education disbanded the locally elected board. The state assumed control of the district in January because six of the district's 48 schools are labeled by the state as being in academic distress.
Ross and Barclay Key are plaintiffs in a lawsuit against state leaders over the takeover. The lawsuit seeks to restore the school system to the control of a locally elected school board. That case is pending before the Arkansas Supreme Court.
"Sadly no one has yet been honest and upfront with you," Ross wrote in the Facebook post to the district's teachers. "We understand that you will still have your union and they are promising that you can negotiate on salary and benefits. But all the protections that you have had will be gone. (If you believe they will negotiate with you on salaries and benefits, I've got some ocean front property in south Arkansas to sell you.)"
Ross, a former district teacher, said the district's plan for the contract came to light as the result of an email that was included among documents he acquired through an Arkansas Freedom of Information Act request.
A second Our Community, Our Schools posting Monday evening defended its earlier report by saying "we hate secret government and firmly believe it is the root of many problems in the LRSD."
The posting also said the district's proposal is "heartbreaking" and "starkly different" from the current contract and that it will cause the loss of good teachers and "repel young talent."
Kurrus said he respects the association and values teachers but he doesn't read blogs and won't negotiate contracts through social media.
"This isn't the big news that people want to make it out to be," he said. "The bigger issues transcend the contract. It's simple. Teaching and learning in the classroom has to be our primary focus, and we always have to remember that we are operating on a budget."
The district's proposal is scant in its provisions. About 2 1/2 of the five pages deal with grievance procedures. The fifth page is a signature sheet. There are no signatures on the page, but there are places for the association leaders, the superintendent and the school board -- in this case the state's education commissioner -- to sign.
The preamble in the draft document states that the district's School Board recognizes the association as the representative of "a majority of LRSD teachers and agrees to negotiate with LREA concerning 'economic conditions of employment' pursuant to LRSD Board Policy HD."
The paragraph expands on that, saying the policy permits the union recognition for the employees as long as that recognition is "deemed by the [School Board] to be in the best interest of the employees and the district."
There is a paragraph on "management rights" that reserves for the superintendent and School Board "the right to hire, direct, assign, suspend, demote and promote all employees, the right to determine qualifications for all employees, the right to establish work schedules for all employees and the right to establish policy."
A paragraph regarding the association's obligations calls for the association to agree not to cause "any curtailment of work or restriction of services or interference with the operations of LRSD and it will not support the action of any employee taken in violation of these obligations. If the LREA violates these obligations, the LRSD Board will withdraw recognition of the LREA and terminate any existing contract(s)."
The draft states teachers will be paid in accordance to the salary schedule for the 2015-16 school year. It said teachers are entitled to insurance, and there is a blank space left for the dollar amount the district will contribute to the employee's health insurance premium.
The district has for many years provided employees with most, if not all, of the cost of their individual health insurance premiums, which is not the case in most Arkansas school districts.
Koehler said the association will seek to preserve that benefit.
"Of course, our primary hope is that we continue to have the health care insurance premium paid at a same amount or close to it as we have had in the past," Koehler said. "That is the most important financial issue to employees and has been in every survey we've ever done."
A Section on 08/11/2015