BUENA PARK : School Trustees OK Salary Proposal

In the first step in contract negotiations for the 1992-93 school year, the Buena Park School District Board of Trustees on Tuesday night approved an initial employment proposal to its teachers.

The proposal outlines the district’s offer to keep salaries in line with agreements reached after negotiations for the current year, although it does not specifically detail possible raises in pay or benefits. Negotiations are conducted annually for the more than 70 teachers at the district’s six elementary schools and one junior high school.

With a projected deficit of more than $1 million, the board has asked Supt. Jack Townsend to suggest ways to balance the $18-million budget. Negotiations with teachers this year will have to take the deficit into consideration when discussing pay increases, said board President Barbara Fagins.

“It is really bad,” she said.

Fagins said she did not know whether the school district will have to consider layoffs to balance the budget or where some of the cutbacks might take place.

“What we want to try and do is preserve as much as we can. Buena Park is a family. The school district is a family,” she said.

The proposal approved Tuesday assures teachers that while their salary schedules will be based on the district’s financial resources, they will not be paid less than what was agreed to in last year’s negotiations. Teaching salaries in the district range from $24,125 for a starting teacher to $54,927 for a teacher with 25 years of experience and a master’s degree.

The district also proposed to contribute no more than $6,045 in health insurance for each full-time employee. Employees with at least 15 years of service in the school district would be covered for 10 years after retirement under the proposal.

The Buena Park Teachers Assn. will consider the proposal and respond to Townsend and a district consultant before a final contract is approved, Fagins said.