Progress was made during the mediation session addressing the Glendive teachers’ contract Monday night.
Prior to the meeting, MEA-MFT field consultant Maggie Copeland, who represents the Glendive Education Association, warned the union’s next step would be to go to fact finding, but instead the GEA presented a counteroffer to the Glendive Unified School Board’s May proposal.
The GEA and GUSB have been negotiating a two-year contract for the school years 2016-17 and 2017-18 since January of 2016.
While salary and insurance remain the main sticking points of the contract, progress was made in other areas of the contract. Tentative agreements were reached on several items Monday, including staff evaluations and class size stipends.
Additional contract items that remain unsettled are bargaining unit recognition language and dual enrollment language.
Three counterproposals were made Monday night during the six-hour mediation session, two from the GEA and one from the GUSB.
The current GEA proposal on the table requests no raise beyond normal steps and lanes increases experienced every year in the first year of the contract (16-17) and a 6 percent raise for 2017-18 across the board.
The GEA also proposes a slight decrease in the amount of insurance the district pays for family plans from two times the single rate to 1.95 times the single rate paid by the district.
Following a 15 percent increase in insurance premiums for 2017-18 and another increase anticipated the following year based on insurance claims in the district this year, school district representatives have focused much of their contract offers on lessening the district insurance burden and instead putting that money into salary increases. With the new insurance year beginning July 1, GUSB representatives have been adamant that they want to settle the contract well before then.
The two entities may meet again in late June, although those dates have yet to be confirmed.
Reach Jamie Ausk Crisafulli at rreditor@rangerreview.com.