Raises proposed for school administrators

A majority of the Sisters School Board would like to give three administrators a raise that would average about 5 percent, total $8,300 for all three and be retroactive to July 1, 1995, the beginning of this school year.

According to school board chairman Bill Reed, the increases are needed to bring administration salaries up to the median for districts of a size comparable to Sisters.

The administrators are Superintendent Judy May, Sisters Middle/Senior High Principal Dennis Dempsey and SM/SH vice-Principal Rich Shultz.

Chairman Reed and board members Harold Gott, Charles Warren and Jan van den Berg appear to support the raises.

Connie Morris disagrees.

"I am not opposed to bringing our administrators into the median range," Morris said, "but given the fact we turned down a $10,000 request to reduce eighth grade overload and can not afford textbooks for every student, I think it would be negligent to give a raise when we can not serve the students directly."

Board member Gott is in favor of the raises, which he says would have been considered last year if negotiations with teachers and other employees had not taken so long.

"I think if we had enough pie to give to the other people in the district, it is not fair to say `we don't have enough pie left for you,' " Gott said. "I do not have a problem rewarding people for their labor."

Gott said the real crunch will come in the next few weeks when the district tries to develop a budget for the next school year.

School district business manager Earl Armbruster, who is not being given a raise because his contract is new this year (the same applies to elementary principal Tim Comfort), said he does not know right now where money for the increase, if approved by the board, will come from.

"I will look at the maintenance budget first, because we have had a good year in fuel oil, then at transportation, because it has been a good year for fuel prices," Armbruster said.

After that, he would go through the rest of the budget looking for the additional dollars, "making sure we don't have a commitment for those dollars between now and the end of June," Armbruster said.

Board chair Reed said the money crisis in public education is extremely frustrating, and he does not like being accused of mismanaging the school district's budget when trying to make impossible trade-off between many deserving demands for every dollar.

"You could ask where we are going to get the money for any single item in the budget," Reed said. "These are good administrators doing a good job who would cost much more to replace if they were to leave.

"They are paid well below the median for schools and districts our size. It does not seem equitable to treat them differently than (other) employees just because they do not have the power of union bargaining. They have a tremendous responsibility and need to be compensated fairly," Reed said.

Morris responds that she does not feel the school district is currently paying--before the raises--that far below what it should for administrators.

"We are (paying salaries) within the range of districts our size and our student population is at the bottom of the range. We are not being irresponsible in what we are paying if we are basing it on the number of children," she said.

"At this point we don't have the money. If money is available next year and we are able to look at it again, then we ought to do so," Morris said.

A decision on the proposed raises will wait until the state has provided school districts with the information on how much money in basic school support will be available.