Mediation fails, West Hempstead school board to begin fact-finding

The state mediator requested by the West Hempstead Board of Education to facilitate contract negotiations with the teachers’ union failed to accomplish that task. Instead, the board has moved to the next level of the impasse process: fact-finding.

The board failed to reach an agreement with members of the West Hempstead Education Association during a five-hour mediated negotiation session on Sept. 28. In a statement posted on the West Hempstead Union Free School District website, www.whufsd.com, last week, the board outlined proposals exchanged during the session, and then announced its decision to move on to fact-finding. The procedure is one in which a state-appointed arbitrator is brought in to review facts, issue findings and make recommendations to both parties.

“We believe we have an obligation to recognize the economic realities facing our district while maintaining the best possible academic program for our students,” board President Pamela Lotito recently told the Herald. “We must consider the revenue uncertainties … the continuing reduction in state aid, the possibility of a tax cap, the Nassau County tax certiorari issue and the economic crisis, which has reduced other revenue sources for our district. We can’t simply pass these costs on to our already struggling homeowners and businesses.”

According to WHEA President Barbara Hafner, the last time negotiations reached the fact-finding phase was in 2003, but both parties agreed to settle a contract before the process began. If fact-finding is the direction in which the board wants to go this time around, “That’s where we’ll go,” Hafner said.

The development will add to the number of days West Hempstead teachers have been working without a contract: Theirs expired in June 2009. It will also affect West Hempstead’s administrators, who will likely have to wait longer to complete negotiations with the board on their own expired contract.

According to Anthony Cali, principal of the Cornwell Avenue Elementary School and president of the 16-member West Hempstead Administrators and Supervisors Association, the board cannot turn its full attention to WHASA’s contract until it has completed negotiations with the teachers’ union.

While WHASA negotiators have been in communication with the board, the process “hasn’t really gone anywhere,” according to Cali, who spoke out about the expired contract at the board’s Oct. 19 meeting. “I know that the focus has been on the teachers, but I just wanted to remind them that our contract is still expired and we’re hoping that we can get it settled,” Cali said. “It’s been quiet in the sense the we haven’t made the same pronouncement as the teachers’ union. We’ve chosen to handle it a little differently.”

While WHEA members have made picket signs and protest shirts and taken to the streets to rally for their cause, WHASA members have remained in what Cali called “silent solidarity” since their contract expired, also in June 2009. “We have no T-shirts, we have no buttons, we have no placards,” Cali said. “We go about doing our job and doing what we need to do to help carry the district. … I don’t believe that we have an adversarial relationship with our central administration, and we’d like to keep it that way.”

Additionally, Cali noted, WHASA recognizes that WHEA’s contract must be settled first because it is a bigger unit. But, he said, “We don’t want anyone to forget that we are also sitting here without a contract and there’s been no movement on that at all.”

According to Cali, the board and WHASA are waiting for lawyers to set a date for a negotiating session.

In response to Cali’s comments about WHEA’s vocal reaction to the negotiation process, Hafner said at the board meeting that the teachers are angry and feel that it is necessary to make that known.

The Proposals

During the last mediated session, the school board proposed a four-year contract with teachers that called for the following:

• 1 percent plus increment* for 2009-10
• 1 percent plus increment for 2010-11
• 1.5 percent plus increment delayed until Feb. 1, 2012
• 1.5 percent plus increment delayed until Feb. 1, 2013

*Increments are built-in yearly increases, known as a step and lane increases.

The mediator suggested that both sides take a break from negotiations in light of economic uncertainties, and proposed 1 percent plus increments for 2009-10 and 2010-11. Everything else, the mediator said, would be taken off the table. Both parties would also temporarily set aside discussion of new teacher evaluation criteria resulting from recent amendments to state law.

After reviewing the proposal, WHEA accepted it on the condition that the district reduce its 18-hour professional staff development requirement. The board rejected WHEA’s proposition.

In response, WHEA made a counterproposal on Oct. 14, calling for the following:

• 1 percent plus increment for 2009-10
• 1 percent plus increment for 2010-11
• 2 percent plus increment for 2011-12
• 2.5 percent plus increment for 2012-13
• Reduction of 18-hour professional staff development
• Put off negotiations on new Annual Professional Performance Review (new teacher evaluations criteria) obligations until after new amendment language is created in the state Legislature.

Hafner called the 18-hour requirement excessive, noting that many teachers exceed professional development requirements on their own anyway. “Any educator that’s worth their weight in gold is going to do whatever it takes to help them help their students be successful. And that’s what these teachers do,” Hafner said. “They don’t need someone pointing the finger and saying ‘You missed an hour. You missed two hours.’ They’re going after whatever professional development they can find, whether it’s on their own or provided from the district — they want to work better, not harder. So, having 18 hours mandated is not necessary.”

The board rejected WHEA’s proposition to reduce professional development hours because doing so would be “counterproductive,” according to Lotito. “Regardless of how many years someone has taught,” she said, “new advances in technology, special education [and] changes in standardized testing, etc., create a need for continued professional development.”

The Community

As the contract negotiation process drags out, a divide in the local community appears to grow. According to some West Hempstead residents, the negotiation process is contentious at times, and although it hasn’t yet affected district students, it may begin to do so.

At the Oct. 19 meeting, district resident and parent Loraine Magaraci asked the board to work harder to resolve the issue for the sake of the teachers, students and community. “People are starting to take sides,” Magaraci said. “I really think it just needs to be resolved. If it were up to me, I’d lock you all in a room until you settled this thing.”

Longtime resident and community activist Seth Bykofsky echoed Magaraci’s sentiments, saying, “The impasse not only divides our community, it disrupts the educational process, upends civility in and out of the classroom and impacts upon students, parents, teachers and administrators alike.”

Both the school board and the teachers’ union “need to move beyond the bickering, the finger-pointing and, yes, the bullying,” Bykofsky said, “… reaching an amicable and fair resolution in which both sides walk away from the table, if not wholly satisfied, then at least content to save the fight for another day.”

The board and the unions appear able to put aside their differences when it comes to showing support for West Hempstead students. A mere hour before Hafner and Cali made their statements to the board, they cheered and clapped for students who presented artwork, performed music and sang for board members on Board Recognition night. 

West Hempstead High choir director Patricia McVetty led the students in song while wearing WHEA’s signature red T-shirt emblazoned with the slogan “Still No End In Sight.” Her colleagues, all wearing the same red shirt, rose in unison to give McVetty and the students a standing ovation.

Hafner said she hopes to reach the point where there is little or no contention, and where all parties can gather to discuss possibilities — as opposed to using representatives to communicate — and amicably reach an agreement. Meanwhile, Lotito said she believes the board has done its “due diligence in reaching out to our students, parents and residents of this district.” 

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