JAY – Disagreement over employee health insurance contributions and wages are major sticking points in efforts between the Jay School Committee and Jay Education Association to reach a contract with educational technicians.

The technicians have been working under a labor agreement that expired June 30, 2006.

Union members say they have made huge concessions, including reduced hours and declassification of technicians resulting in pay cuts, but are still willing to compromise and accept the majority fact-finding recommendations on wages and health insurance.

“Although our hours have been cut back and our work load remains the same, the education of the Jay students remains our top priority,” negotiators said in a news release.

Association President Mike Henry said the education technicians are vital to the school system.

“They are the ones whose helping hands make it possible for some of our most challenged students to succeed. These employees should be treated as the valuable assets they truly are,” Henry stated.

Negotiators will meet today with a mediator to try to reach an agreement. The committee’s major objective, Chairwoman Mary Redmond-Luce said, is to bring wages and health insurance contributions of educational technicians more in line with comparable employees.

“The School Committee does not believe that the recent recommendation of a divided fact-finding panel adequately meets this objective,” Redmond-Luce said.

The majority fact-finding report sides with the association on health insurance contributions and wages. The panel is made up of three members, one each representing the school department and labor and a neutral chairperson.

The School Committee is seeking a two-year contract while the union wants a three-year contract to expire June 30, 2009, rather than June 30, 2008.

The committee’s proposal would require employees to contribute 11 percent of the total health premium cost of the entire year with the exception of freezing the contribution for single subscribers at $60 per month, the current rate. No retroactive contribution would be recommended so long as wages are not paid retroactively.

The association’s representative prefers a more graduated increase though the union agrees with committee’s offer to freeze the single plan contribution and there be no retroactive pay.

Under the committee’s proposal for the 2007-08 school year, employees choosing a two-adult plan would be required to contribute $125.96 monthly toward the $1,145.11 monthly premium, which represents more than 57 percent increase than the current contribution of $80.

Employees would be required to pay $153.34 toward the monthly premium of $1,393.96 for the family plan, about a 70 percent increase over the current $90 contribution.

The association proposes employees’ contribution for a two-adult plan be 10 percent, representing $114.51 monthly, a 43 percent increase, and contribution for a family plan be 9 percent, representing $125.46, a 39 percent increase.

The majority panel stated that an approximate 40 percent increase is significant, and is less disruptive to the employees in this unit than their dissenting colleagues recommended increase of 57 percent or more.

The committee’s representative favors the committee’s recommendation stating that educational technicians would continue to contribute significantly less to premiums than others in the school system.

The School Committee is recommending a wage increase of 3 percent the first year and 2.25 percent the second year, assuming a two-year contract, with no retroactive pay for the first year.

The association proposes a 3 percent increase for the first year of a two-year contract, without retroactivity the first year but with the increase computed in the base pay scale and a 3.25 percent increase the second year.

The minority report stated that with the increase committee members are proposing, education technicians would still be paid more than other education technicians in the area.