Corona Teachers Hit Lottery Money Plan : Superintendent Proposes Using Funds for Programs and Salaries

A proposal to use less than half of its incoming lottery money to give bonuses to teachers and other employees is drawing fire from the teachers’ union and some board members in the Corona-Norco Unified School District.

Jason Scott, president of the Corona-Norco Teachers’ Assn., said the teachers, who settled for a 4% salary increase last fall, believe that they deserve a larger piece of the lottery pie and should not have to share it with non-instructional employees.

Schools Supt. Don Helms, who made the recommendation Tuesday night, said the district’s first lottery allotment--about $841,000--can be better used by apportioning it among both personnel and programs.

The school board delayed a decision on allocating the lottery funds for at least two weeks.

“We are the ones in the classroom, having the one-to-one contact with our students, and that’s what the money was intended for,” Scott said.

Wants Salary Bonuses

Lottery revenues are designated for instructional purposes, Scott said Wednesday, and salaries account for 95.9% of the district’s instructional budget. “We just want to apply that (proportion) to lottery funds too,” he said.

Helms proposed that the school district spend $377,000--or 45% of its first lottery revenue--to give each full-time employee a $300 bonus and each part-time employee a $150 bonus.

“I believe that every employee, regardless of his or her title or work responsibility, contributes to the education of our children. . . ,” Helms said in his recommendation. “All of our employees are underpaid, considering their responsibilities and contributions to the district and to the children of our community.”

The superintendent recommended that the school board divide about $160,000 in lottery funds among the district’s 24 schools for materials, equipment and supplies; allocate $134,000 for “mini-grants” for home-grown programs and projects, and spend $169,000 to hire 26 teachers’ aides and to buy supplies for district-wide use.

‘Teachers Are Outraged

“I totally disagree with the superintendent’s interpretations of the law and the recommendations he made,” school board member Charles H. Carter said. “The teachers are outraged at the proposal. . . . If we don’t do more for these teachers, we are going to be faced with a crisis. . . .

su “I think the district should spend the lion’s share of the money to give teachers a supplementary salary increase. . . . I think that’s the intent of the law. I don’t think there was any intent on the part of the voters that this money should be spent on any purpose other than the classroom. . . .

“The (non-teaching) employees are not entitled to this money.”

Salaries Said to Be Lowest

Teachers’ salaries in the Corona-Norco district are the lowest in the area, Carter said, making it difficult to recruit and retain good teachers. District officials said they have no data to compare their teachers’ salaries with those in nearby or similar-sized districts.

“No one . . . was satisfied with the amount of money that was available last year for salary and fringe benefit negotiations,” Helms said in his recommendation to the school board. “It is my strong desire to see the board work now and in the future to improve the salary schedules for all of our employees.”

In September, the teachers accepted a one-year contract granting them a 4% pay hike, plus a 2.4% increase in the number of hours for which they are paid. Because of experience and training advancement, however, 404 of the district’s 671 teachers have received pay increases of 10.8% or more this year, Helms said.

Non-teaching employees, working under a three-year contract that expires in October, 1987, received a 4.9% pay increase last year, said Lee V. Pollard, assistant superintendent for personnel and evaluation services.