Despite the extra day of paid leave for teachers offered by the Harford County school system, the Harford County Education Association is still filing an impasse in its contract talks.
Randall Cerveny, president of the HCEA, said Wednesday the state Fairness in Negotiations Act requires the organization to file an impasse request to the Public Labor Relations Board, which is the only group capable of officially declaring one.
As of Wednesday morning, Cerveny said, HCEA was in the process of filling out and submitting the paperwork necessary to file the request.
This negotiating has been under way between the HCEA, which represents around 3,200 classroom teachers, counselors, psychologists and additional staff, and the board of education since last year.
In January, the two groups agreed on a 3 percent cost of living raise, pending funding of about $14million from the county. When that funding was not supplied, negotiations started again.
Although Cerveny said he could not release what amount the HCEA was asking for, he did say that this time around the request was for "substantially less" than the original, but still a raise.
"[We're] asking for an increase because the money is available," he said.
The HCEA hired a financial consultant during the bargaining process, who, according to Cerveny, was able to find areas in the budget where the money could be found for increases. Because negotiations are ongoing, Cerveny could not say where the money was found, but did say the funds were there.
"Hopefully a compromise will come where the employees will be compensated as fairly as they can be, under the circumstances," he said.
Thus far, the school system has offered an extra paid day off, according to Manager of Communications Teri Kranefeld. The paid day has not been determined yet but would be on a day when students were out of school and essentially, teachers would be paid to work a certain number of days and work one day less at no added cost to the school system.
For Cerveny, the concern is keeping Harford County at competitive rates. School system employees have not had a cost of living raise since the 2008-09 school year.
"Harford County is one of the lowest paid counties in the state," he said.
Unless they can offer competitive salaries and benefits, he said, "we're not going to get the better teachers." Cerveny also added that most teachers come from out of state because Maryland does not produce enough to sustain the need.
The teachers who come from out of state, he said, don't know what Harford County is like or that it's a great place to live. They may apply for Harford County jobs but only as a fallback to other counties, he added.
Although a school system news release stated the Harford County Education Services Council, or HCESC, has tentatively agreed to the new contract with an extra paid leave day, Cerveny said the HCEA was aware of the offer at the negotiation table and is still submitting impasse paperwork.
HCESC represents school system employees in instructional support positions such as nurses, paraeducators and inclusion helpers.