ALAN CHOATE - Daily Herald | Posted: Tuesday, April 17, 2007 11:00 pm
State leaders kept wrangling Tuesday over money appropriated for teacher raises, and lawmakers wondered if school districts were fiddling with a database used to determine how many teachers there are in the state.
In the end, legislators made a technical recommendation concerning how to incorporate the raises into school district salary schedules. The exact amount of the per-teacher raise is not clear, which annoyed many of the lawmakers on the Executive Appropriations Committee.
Senate President John Valentine, R-Orem, also said he wants an audit of the Computer Aided Credentials of Teachers in Utah Schools database, known as CACTUS, because of fluctuations in the numbers since this year's legislative session adjourned.
Legislators have been pressing education officials over the raises, which were intended to boost teacher pay by $2,500 across the board. Since individual districts -- not the state -- set salary schedules, however, concerns arose about how the raises would be implemented.
Sen. Curt Bramble, R-Provo, said he'd received word from an Alpine School District employee that the district intended the raises to be a one-time bump that could be backed out in subsequent years -- a position he criticized.
On Tuesday, state schools superintendent Patti Harrington said there were concerns that the new funding wouldn't be there in future years. She said she'd received "verbal assurances" from legislative leaders that the money would continue to be there.
There were more assurances at Tuesday's meeting.
"The intent was to give each teacher $2,500," said Rep. Brad Dee, R-Ogden and the sponsor of the raise legislation. "That was the intent, that when it reaches the teacher's paycheck it's $2,500."
A proposed state rule should direct school districts to add the raise amount within each district's salary schedule, committee members decided. Dee asked for a report on how districts plan to administer the raises.
Originally, lawmakers allocated $2,638 per teacher to provide a cushion for payroll deductions. New figures from CACTUS, however, show that the appropriated money now will fund $2,480 per teacher before payroll deductions.
"Why those numbers changed, I don't know," said Patrick Ogden, the associate superintendent for data and business services. The totals changed by "a couple hundred," he said. There are about 24,000 teachers in Utah.
Harrington said the new numbers are actually a good development from the districts.
"We have been after them for months and years to clean up CACTUS" and make sure information is up to date, she said. "They have greater incentive than ever before."
State Rep. Dave Clark, R-Santa Clara, wondered if someone was "gaming the system." He also said legislators might have to add more money to the pot to make sure the $2,500 per-teacher raise target is reached.
Alan Choate can be reached at 344-2556 or atchoate@heraldextra.com.
This story appeared in The Daily Herald on page A1.