District says it needs fall enrollment counts before approving full teacher‑pay plan; union presses for clearer commitment on $1.7M allocation

At a July 15 bargaining session at Groveland Elementary, the district representative presented a draft memorandum of understanding implementing the classroom teacher salary increase allocation created by House Bill 5001E and said the district’s adjusted share is $1,700,000.

The district representative noted the state Department of Education emailed guidance on July 1 that “we must have a plan approved by the school board and ratified by the union and must be submitted by October 1,” and added the district must provide an August 4 update on ratification timelines. The official said that after adding the stated fringe rate (21.85%) the funds for payroll approach about $2.1 million.

Why it matters: the MOU determines which classroom teachers qualify, how the district will record the eligible employees and when the money is paid. The statute caps recurring increases at $3,000 per eligible teacher; the district said any leftover money after applying that cap must be redistributed to teachers under applicable law.

The district proposed using a September 15 snapshot of staffing to identify qualifying classroom teachers so it can pull accurate payroll data and apply bands or an equal distribution as elected by the union. “The portion adjusted for us is $1,700,000,” the agency official said when announcing the allocation and the fringe estimate.

Union negotiators pushed for clearer language that the $1.7 million would not be the final word if the district later determined additional compensation was affordable. The union asked for an additional roughly $100,000 to be added to the TSIA/compensation pool. “We ask for basically an additional $100,000,” the presenter said.

The district responded that it cannot commit additional district funds at this time because the school board wants to base compensation decisions on fall enrollment counts and overall budget outlook. The district said those FTE counts typically firm up in the 10‑day and October counts and that board leaders are acting to preserve the district’s fiscal health. The representative also warned that failure to ratify by the statutory deadline could lead either party to file for impasse; if impasse is declared an arbitrator would fashion a distribution consistent with the law.

Negotiators debated whether the MOU should include example bands, concrete dollar amounts, or a short “statement of intent” to return to the table if enrollment and budget data permit higher compensation. The district said it will accept banding language provided by the union and can include bands in a revised draft, but reiterated that it cannot promise money beyond the statutory allocation at this time.

Next steps: the parties agreed to continue bargaining on July 21, 2–4 p.m. at the district office. The district said it will send a revised Word document with the proposed bands before that meeting and will provide a distribution report after funds are processed, showing which teachers received payments and any leftover amounts redistributed to teachers.

Context and sources: discussion and figures above are drawn from the July 15 bargaining transcript, during which participants explicitly referenced the state Department of Education guidance (July 1), the statutory $3,000 cap, a district‑adjusted allocation of $1,700,000 and a fringe rate of 21.85%.