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DALLAS TWP. &#8212; Two days after its teachers&#8217; union voted to strike Sept. 28 if no progress is made on contract negotiations, the Dallas School Board issued a written statement contending factors largely beyond its control are forcing the district to push for substantial contract changes.Stressing the board &#8220;values the quality of critical education services&#8221; from teachers, the statement &#8212; addressed to &#8220;citizens&#8221; of the district &#8212; notes &#8220;the board is concerned and disappointed&#8221; by the planned strike.&#8220;Much has changed since the Dallas School Board and the Dallas Education Association settled their last contract in 2011,&#8221; the statement contends, listing three &#8220;fiscal hurdles&#8221; the board faces:1) Soaring pension costs, set by a state agency. The annual pension payment rose from $386,976 in 2011 to more than $1.9 million in 2016, a 401-percent increase. &#8220;Currently, the district is required to contribute 30 percent of each dollar of salary to the pension fund,&#8221; with the state reimbursing about half that.2) Health insurance costs, which rose 24.3 percent over the last three years. The statement notes administrators and other staff pay part of their health insurance premium, while teachers don&#8217;t.3) A teacher salary matrix which provides raises for teachers each year for the first 16 years &#8212; known as &#8220;steps&#8221; &#8212; which has a &#8220;defective design.&#8221;The statement notes 49 percent of union members are in steps 10 through 15 and set to get raises between 4.8 percent and 7.8 percent, with those moving to step 16 getting a raise of 11.96 percent. Teachers above step 16 get a $1,000 raise each year.Meeting all those increases is difficult in part because the state restricts property tax increases each year, the statement notes. In the last five years, the board approved tax increases ranging from 2 percent to 4 percent &#8220;which have only partially paid for the increases in pension, healthcare and salaries, so we have had to make significant cuts to the budget in other areas.&#8221;As an illustration, the statement says the maximum state tax increase last year generated about $550,000 in additional income, and $450,000 of that went to pay pension and healthcare increases. When all the numbers were crunched, and despite the $550,000 tax increase, the board had to find $597,000 in cuts to balance the budget.&#8220;We implore the Dallas Education Association to please continue to work with us to resolve this financial problem,&#8221; the statement concludes. &#8220;We remain committed to continually working with the DEA to negotiate a contract that will be fair to the teachers and the taxpayers and to do everything within reason to avoid a strike.&#8221;The two sides have scheduled five negotiation sessions before the Sept. 28 strike date.<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta>By Mark Guydishmguydish@www.timesleader.com</bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta>Reach Mark Guydish at 570-991-6112 or on Twitter @TLMarkGuydish</shirttailMeta></div>

Dallas School Board responds to teachers’ union strike notice