Forest Grove board approves three-year agreement with classified employees
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Summary
The Forest Grove School District Board approved a three-year tentative agreement with OSEA-classified staff covering school years 2025–28, including phased salary increases, insurance cap changes, a special-education assistant grade change and other benefits; the motion passed in a roll-call affirmation.
The Forest Grove School District Board of Directors voted Feb. 10 to approve a tentative three-year agreement with the Oregon School Employees Association (OSEA) covering classified employees for school years 2025–2028. The board approved the contract after a presentation by Sarah Hamlin, the district’s director of human resources.
Hamlin told the board the negotiating teams began meeting in April, paused over the summer and resumed through fall and winter, reaching tentative agreements and final TAs on Jan. 21. She said the association held a ratification vote last week and “overwhelmingly voted to ratify the contract.” Hamlin described the agreement as the result of extensive negotiations and said it included several operational clarifications intended to be clear for staff and supervisors.
Key provisions Hamlin highlighted include phased salary increases over the life of the contract, updated insurance caps and a new requirement that the OSEA pool begin contributing toward employee premiums in the 2026–27 benefit year. The agreement moves special-education instructional assistants to grade 6 effective in 2026–27 and provides a $0.50-per-hour differential for skills trainers at Oak Grove Academy. The contract also doubles tuition-reimbursement funding, increases the translation/interpretation differential to $0.50 per hour, allows employees on work terms of less than 12 months to spread pay to match their work year rather than be paid over 12 months, and establishes a sick-leave pool from which eligible classified staff can request days.
Director Richard Truax, who participated in negotiations, praised the collaborative process: “We got through those rocky issues and moved toward agreement,” he said. Board members voiced appreciation for the hours put in by negotiating teams and the transparency of the process.
A motion to approve the proposed OSEA classified-employees agreement was moved and then affirmed on the record; the transcript records affirmative responses from attending board members and the chair declared the motion passed. Following the vote the board recessed to an executive session scheduled to consider a grievance appeal.
The agreement takes effect across the specified school years; implementation details such as the department responsible for administration of new differentials and the timeline for payroll changes were discussed in the presentation and will be handled by the district’s human-resources office.
The board recessed at 6:09 p.m. and reconvened in executive session as announced on the record.