An Important Negotiations Reminder to Business Administrators

NJSBA Announces Sale of Northern Field Office

NJSBA Board of Directors to Meet

Audit Questions DOE Oversight

School Violence Edges Up Slightly

Obituary: Wesley Lance, an Author of New Jersey’s Constitution

Obituary: Dr. Boyle, Somerset ESC Superintendent

NJSBA on the Air

Workshop 2007—Ethics Do’s and Don’ts

Calendar

Click here for a pdf version of this issue of School Board Notes

This reminder is specifically directed to school business administrators and any other school administrators responsible for salaries and payroll.  

If your district is currently in negotiations over a collective bargaining agreement with your teachers’ association, and the parties have not yet reached an agreement, and if the expired teachers contract was of three years duration, then your district is prohibited from advancing teachers a step on the salary guide until a new agreement is in place.  This prohibition is pursuant to the Neptune Township N.J. Supreme Court decision (144 N.J.16, 1996). 

Based on this court decision (and subsequent case-law), this means that, until a new agreement is in place and ratified: 

• Teaching staff members may not be advanced a step on the expired guide or paid their increments;
  
  
• Teaching staff members may not be moved to an advanced column on the guide (e.g., BA+30, MA, or MA+30); 
  
  
• Teaching staff members may not be given increased longevity amounts for which they would otherwise be eligible;
  
  
• Support staff members who are covered by the same collective bargaining agreement as teachers may also not receive increments, horizontal advancement, or increases in longevity, until a new agreement is reached.  

In other words, these staff members must be maintained at the salary they were being paid as of June 30 when the contract expired.  

This holding only applies to expired three-year contracts; it does not apply to expired one-year or two-year agreements.  It also does not apply to support staff members who have a negotiated agreement separate from the teachers.