Fair Lawn Teachers Reach Tentative Contract Agreement

Negotiating teams for the Fair Lawn Education Association and the have reached a tentative agreement on a new teacher contract, lead FLEA negotiator Dawn Ebner said Monday.

Details of the agreement -- reached Wednesday night at a negotiating sesson -- won't be released until it's approved, Ebner said. The agreement's approval is contingent on its presentation and subsequent adoption by members of both FLEA and the Board of Ed.

If either FLEA or the Board of Ed votes "No," Ebner said, both sides will be forced to return to the negotiation process.

"We just came up with an agreement and it's totally up to the Association to see if it’s an acceptable one," she said.

Ebner said a date hadn't been set to bring forth the contract agreement for a vote, but said she expected it to take place this month, hopefully by the Dec. 15 Board meeting.

On Friday, Superintendent Bruce Watson said he was "very positive" about the tenor of recent negotiations between the teachers union and the Board.

"For the first time in quite a while now I’m finally feeling very positive that both sides are talking positively on getting to the end of this, which is encouraging," Watson said. "I understand both sides and my focus is really on bringing harmony back and getting focused on children and their education, so I think we’re almost there."

Fair Lawn teachers have been working under an expired contract since June 30, 2010.

At October's BOE meeting, .

FLEA president Gene Kuffel gave a nearly 10-minute prepared speech in which he referenced what was, at the time, apparently the sticking point in negotiations -- health care premiums.

He said that FLEA had offered an insurance plan that would save more than $1 million each year in premiums, but which had been refused by the Board.

“You continue to push a health insurance plan that is an unnecessary financial burden to the taxpayers and teachers,” Kuffel said at October's BOE meeting. “In most cases as a result of your insurance proposal, teachers will never make more money than they did last year. Ever.”

Eugene Banta, the Board of Ed's lead negotiator, responded that the two sides disagreed on the extent of savings the teachers' proposed plan offered.

“We don’t agree with the numbers,” Banta said of the $1 million savings figured touted by Kuffel. “It’s as simple as that.” 

Since neither Ebner nor Watson would offer any details of the tentative agreement, it's not yet known if the health insurance issue was resolved in recent negotiations.