By Olivia Gieger/VTDigger
The Rutland school board moved Friday, May 9, to impose a contract on Rutland City’s teachers, a day after an overwhelming majority of the union’s members voted to strike next week without a deal.
The two sides have been negotiating a new teachers’ contract for 18 months.
“After 18 months of fruitless talks with a board that seems more eager to fight, manipulate, threaten, and walk away than reach a settlement with us, we have had enough and we’re not going to take it anymore,” said Sue Tanen, the union’s elected president, in a press release issued May 8.
If the board fails to reach a settlement with the union before the start of school Wednesday, May 14, it will be Vermont’s first teachers’ strike in nearly a decade. The Burlington Education Association struck in 2017.
“We’ve been ready to settle since we began. We’ve been ready to agree to the recommendations of a neutral factfinder, despite being far less than we’ve sought,” Tanen added. “And what has the board done instead? Proffer mistake-riddled offers because creating accurate salary schedules is ‘hard,’ according to the superintendent. Authorize their attorney — who has so far charged taxpayers over $116,000 for his work representing the board — to issue threats of court injunctions and unilateral imposition of working conditions. And, sadly, walked away from Monday’s mediation session.”
According to Tanen, she and her colleagues are among the lowest paid in the state; have the least amount of sick leave in the region; and are unable to consistently collaborate for their students.
In a meeting, Friday afternoon, the Rutland Board of School Commissioners responded by imposing terms for this and the next school year on the teachers’ union.
“The board has a fiduciary responsibility to make a fair contract that is sustainable,” said Board Commissioner Charlene Seward, Friday. “We don’t want taxes to go up, and that’s what will happen. We don’t want to make layoffs. There is not a secret pile of money we are sitting on.”
The union’s leadership objected to the School Board’s vote, saying in a news release that imposing terms for two years — and not just one — defies Vermont law. They cited a primer of labor law provided by the Vermont Labor Relations Board.
Seward said the Board released two separate contracts (one for each year) to comply. She added that because Rutland’s voters approved an education budget for the 2025-26 school year, the Board believes it can create a contract for that year.
The School Board and union had been expecting to continue working through the details after school Friday. But the Board now says the imposition of contract terms puts an end to those talks.
The teachers’ union’s statement said leaders still hope to negotiate and avoid a strike starting May 14. The union posted a photo of their negotiators waiting to begin Friday evening talks with the Board, even though the Board said the talks would no longer be happening.
It is unclear when they will resume.
Seward said the Board tabled Friday’s talks after not receiving a response from union representatives to an email about timing. However the union disputes this and provided VTDigger with emails from the lead negotiator to the district superintendent, saying “The Board needs to send a team that is authorized to make a deal. We hope to see your team after school today.”
The decision not to meet “was not on a contentious basis,” Seward said. “We definitely want to keep talking, hopefully soon,” she added.
The negotiations have exhausted the tools for mediation set out in state law, which concluded with an independent fact-finder whose report was delivered to each side last month. For the union, that meant the next step was deciding whether to strike. For the Board, it was imposing contract terms for a period of one year. Each tactic is designed to force an agreement.
The Board’s new terms include a salary increase of 4.8% for the first year and 4% in the second year. It’s a step back down from the offer the Board made earlier this week: 5% increases in base salaries for both school years, on the condition that a strike is avoided. They are also offering one additional sick day, rather than the fact finder’s recommended two.
The union is asking for larger salary increases to keep teachers’ pay in line with their peers across the state, and in line with a living wage for Rutland. The union has agreed to the terms outlined by the independent fact-finder.
The primary dispute comes down to what those salary increases include. The union is asking for a percentage increase over and above the annual step up in wages that would occur each year. The Board is offering a percentage increase that includes the step increases. The Board’s terms also outline deeper restructuring to these salary grid steps for incoming teachers.
“Our hope is that they reverse course,” union president Sue Tanen said in the press release. “Otherwise, we will do what we promised — begin our strike on Wednesday.”
