Resort-Area Voters May Give Teachers a Lift

Casey Doherty, a third-grade teacher, sometimes finds herself serving burritos to her students and their families while she works as a night-shift waitress at a Mexican restaurant.

Depending on the time of year, high school art teacher Berneil Bannon works as many as four other jobs, including walking dogs, to pay the rent.

“In the beginning of my teaching career, I had to deliver pizzas,” said Tom Treat, who has taught in this ski resort for 23 years. “I also would kid-sit for parents who were leaving town for a week or two.”

For years, the high cost of living has forced many Vail-area teachers to live like ski bums. But now the community is trying to do something about it.

Voters in Eagle County, home to Vail, are being asked Nov. 6 to raise property taxes to boost teachers’ salaries. Similar proposals are on the ballot in Aspen and in the counties that include the ski resorts of Breckenridge, Steamboat Springs and Winter Park.

If voters approve the additional taxes, the Eagle County district’s 378 teachers will get a cost-of-living increase averaging about $4,600 a year. The current starting salary is $30,000.

“We don’t want my daughter’s teacher to be delivering pizza to our door,” said Karen Strakbein, finance director for the Eagle County School District.

A teacher shortage that has affected districts nationwide has been compounded in Vail and other resort towns by a high cost of living.

The average price for a condo in Vail is $518,000. A single-family home averages $1.04 million. Only 20% of the town’s employees live within the city limits.

“We have a ‘three or three’ rule here: You either have three roommates or three jobs,” Strakbein said.

The ballot measures were made possible by a new state law that a Vail citizens’ group helped pushed through.

Joy Overbeck, a Vail-area resident, argues that it would be better to give teachers merit raises.

“The district is relentlessly average. We don’t want to reward all the teachers without pinpointing the ones who should be rewarded,” she said. “We first have to identify who the quality teachers are.”

Eagle County district officials last year offered a $1,000 bonus to teachers who agreed to stay another year, but 10% didn’t return. With additional teachers hired because of the area’s growing population and 27 teachers on sabbaticals, 24% of this year’s staff is new.