District employees to get 1.48 percent raise
The Hudson Board of Education approved a 1.48 percent pay raise for the district’s teachers and support staff at their meeting last week.
Following the passage of a state law limiting negotiations for union employees to base salary, the district and members of the teachers’ union, WCEA, agreed to the increase which will be retroactive to the first day of the 2011-12 school year, when the current agreement expired.
According to Director of Human Services Nancy Sweet, the new law eliminates the former salary schedule which had teachers’ salary calculated on a grid that took into account both years of experience and education. Salary increases are now based only on the salary an individual was receiving in the period before a new agreement.
Sweet said the district is exploring a new compensation schedule but anything adopted would have to comply with new state law on the issue.
Starting salary in Hudson for a teacher with a bachelor’s degree was $35,580 according to 2010-11 salary schedule.
The board also approved the same increase for support staff. For those employees working a 12-month schedule, the 1.48 percent increase is retroactive to July 1, 2011, the start of the district’s fiscal year. For those employees who work only during the school year, the raise is retroactive to Sept. 1, 2011, the first day of school.
The agreement does not affect employees’ benefits. Sweet said teachers began paying the employee’s share, approximately 6 percent of salary, into the Wisconsin Retirement System. Prior to the change in the law, the district, like most in Wisconsin, was contributing both the employer’s share and the employee’s share.
Beginning July 1, the district has an agreement to pay 87.4 percent of the cost of a health insurance selected by the district. Other insurance is calculated separately with the cost being shared by the district and employees.
For more information contact Sweet’s office at (715) 377-3706.