A bill that would raise minimum teacher salaries to $27,000 this coming school year and $30,000 the next made it through a divided Legislature Friday with concerns still resonating that local budgets will be forced to go up as teachers across the board demand higher pay.
The vote was 76 to 68 in the House and 18 to 16 in the Senate. Those who voted against the pay hike said they were doing so not to deny the lowest-paid teachers a raise, but out of fear the move would force local school boards to increase pay at every level.
“This bill will set a new minimum, and the minimum becomes the zero step on the salary schedule,” said Dale Douglass of the Maine School Management Association, representing superintendents across the state.
He predicted there would be pressure to open existing teacher contracts, saying the bill takes away local control over salaries.
“It’s intruding on the local collective bargaining process by enforcing a base salary that wasn’t arrived at locally,” Douglass said.
Gov. John Baldacci had called for a $30,000 minimum teacher salary in his state of the state address in January. It was taken out of the supplemental budget, but put into legislation that raises salaries in two steps.
Some argue splitting the salary in two was a way to allow this Legislature to approve the pay increase without coming up with a way to pay for it. There was talk Friday night about forcing the bill to go to the Appropriations Committee for review when the Legislature comes back into session on May 22.
Education Commissioner Susan Gendron said the state will pick up the first installment of $620,000 to bring those teachers below the minimum up to $27,000. To bring the rest up to $30,000 would cost just over $2 million and the language in the bill is “it is the intent of the Legislature,” that the next Legislature would appropriate that amount in 2007.
Gendron, who said she was “ecstatic” at the passage of the bill, said it would not force the reopening of existing teacher contracts.
“This does not open up contracts,” she said, and over time, higher teachers salaries would be part of what’s paid for under the state’s school aid formula, Essential Programs and Services or EPS, where the state ultimately will pick up 55 percent of the cost of local education statewide.
Rep. Stephen Bowen, R-Rockport, a teacher and member of the Appropriations Committee, warned the pay hike would lead to property tax increases.
“I hate getting up and speaking about this because I’m a teacher,” he said, but this “will continue to put pressure on the property tax.”
“It doesn’t identify a funding source,” he said, and the next Legislature does not have to fund the $2 million mentioned in the bill. “One Legislature cannot bind another.”
Rep. Christopher Babbidge, D-Kennebunk, who is also a teacher, said he was supporting the bill for those who teach in rural Maine, whose salaries tend to be the lowest.
“I’m a suburban teacher, who in this case is advocating for rural teachers,” Babbidge said.
“Will there be an upward impact? Yes, probably. I’m not sure that’s such a bad thing,” he said.
Rep James Schatz, D-Blue Hill, who represents one of those rural districts, said the “upper pressure on the wage structure” will force school boards to make choices that could hurt students, like increasing class size.
“You’ll find an erosion of educational services just as you’ll find an erosion on the commitment to property tax relief,” Schatz said.
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