Bangor teachers still without contract

BANGOR – Teacher contract negotiations here remain at a standstill after both sides returned to the table Monday night, but made little progress toward resolving a number of issues surrounding salary, benefits and leave time.

“We started out well and got on the same page,” Cynthia Fish, chief negotiator for the Bangor Education Association, said Tuesday.

“But then the tone seemed to change and in the end we were unable to reach tentative agreements on any items.”

The school committee “made substantial concessions,” said Superintendent Robert Ervin who had been optimistic about Monday’s meeting after conducting a series of “informal discussions around virtually every issue” with BEA President Adam Leach during Christmas vacation.

“Unfortunately, the negotiations did not result in the gains that I had hoped, although I felt that the proposals the school committee made would go a long way in addressing the concerns that have consistently been presented to us,” he added.

Fish said a new proposal regarding personal leave had been deemed unsatisfactory by teachers because it “would more than likely lead to more misunderstanding and confusion as to what would be

noncompelling and recreational.”

In addition, it “still allowed the superintendent to make a judgement as to what he felt was appropriate,” she said.

But Ervin said the school board’s new proposal “reduces the opportunity for friction around personal leave.”

He pointed out that he is required to approve personal leave based on contract language negotiated over the past 20 years.

But both sides also continue to lock horns over health benefits and salary.

Teachers have rejected the school committee’s salary proposal because they say it doesn’t include a cost of living increase. And while teachers are willing to pay their fair share of health insurance premiums for dependents, said Fish, “the school committee wants us to pick up an even larger portion which would cause our teachers to actually lose money in their paycheck.”

Ervin said the school committee “made a major concession” Monday by proposing to cap at 8 percent its share of the increase in insurance costs for dependents while continuing to pay 100 percent of teachers’ single subscriber insurance costs.

“We feel the teachers have the best health insurance plan in the area and we’re simply asking for them to participate in the cost. The taxpayer can’t be expected to absorb the kinds of increases that are coming down the line,” he said.

Fish said the school committee’s willingness to absorb all of the teachers’ single subscriber payments is “very much appreciated.”

Meanwhile, Ervin called Monday’s meeting “the first night of negotiations in which there was an honest exchange of views.”

Fish said teachers remain optimistic, although “each time we walk away from the table without results, it’s discouraging. It affects our morale and our working conditions.”

While there’s no definite date to continue discussions, “it appears that both sides are willing to [have] further talks at the table when either side makes a request,” she said.