Posted on 07/29/2010 8:19:32 PM PDT by Coleus
The Christie administration is worried that school district chiefs will try to skirt a new salary cap by extending their old contracts. Education Commissioner Bret Schundler told county superintendents to start imposing the cap on new contracts now rather than waiting until the new rules are formally in place.
Last week the governor announced that to curb "exorbitant" wages and save taxpayers’ money, no district superintendents should make more than his own $175,000 salary, unless they work in the biggest cities or earn bonuses. Christie said the cap would take effect for superintendents when their individual contracts expired, and the Education Department specified that the cap would be imposed after three public hearings, perhaps as soon as December.
The proposal infuriated many school leaders, who said it would lead to an exodus of talent and called for more time for debate. The administration, however, has sped up the plan instead. At a Wednesday meeting, county superintendents told the commissioner they had heard that some district leaders wanted to prolong their current contracts to avoid the looming caps, education spokesman Alan Guenther said Friday. He said the commissioner was concerned about that possibility and told county superintendents to prevent it by imposing the cap on any new contracts now. There is no plan to impose it on unexpired contracts.
"We announced the new cap to restore order and rationality to the pay scale for administrators," Guenther said. "County superintendents will exercise their authority to review contracts and to reject contracts that try to circumvent efforts to control spending." Some educators and advocates were upset by the news and questioned the administration’s legal authority to change regulations before public input.
"To start it before you even adjusted the code to reflect the new policy seems inappropriate, confusing to folks and destabilizing for leadership," said Lynne Strickland, executive director of the Garden State Coalition of Schools. "There are some important technical questions … but it’s getting rammed through." "I don’t think you can make rules through a press conference," echoed Richard Bozza, executive director of the New Jersey Association of School Administrators. "Our position is there is no cap until the rules are in place" through the standard process, which includes public testimony.
Guenther, the Education Department spokesman, said he had no proof that any particular district chief was trying to game the system by extending a contract. He added that the cap would not be imposed on a contract that was negotiated recently and already in the final stages of review by a county superintendent. According to Christie’s office, 70 percent of superintendents statewide earn more than the salary cap, which would save taxpayers $9.8 million yearly. The cap would limit superintendent pay by student enrollment; chiefs of districts with 250 children, for example, could not make a base salary exceeding $120,000. The plan also included options for annual merit bonuses worth up to 15 percent of pay.
Many superintendents were upset and demoralized by Christie’s plan, saying it undermined local control. They also noted the caps didn’t take into account a superintendent’s length of service or advanced degrees and didn’t apply to such highly paid public employees as police chiefs, university officials and the Rutgers University football coach. The Christie administration "is making us feel like criminals and that’s not fair," said Terrance Brennan, Pompton Lakes school superintendent, who makes about $197,000 in his 37th year as an educator. "We’ve spent many dedicated years taking care of children. To be treated this way at the end of our careers is wrong. We didn’t create this situation."
Christie’s office argued that, on average, superintendent salaries have grown nearly 46 percent since 2001 — well beyond the rate of inflation and more than overall education spending. The governor said it was unfair to make taxpayers who have lost jobs and homes pay for such growing paychecks. School boards say they must outbid each other to recruit good superintendents who have contracts of three-to-five years instead of tenure. Brennan, who is retiring in June, said it would be hard to find a quality replacement under the new cap of $165,000 for his district of 1,750 children. "If you’re a principal, why would you give up tenure to take a superintendency for so little pay?" he asked.
Some superintendents have said they might move to avoid the cap. In New York, for example, many suburban superintendents earn more than Christie. School chiefs make $244,000 in Ardsley, $255,000 in Chappaqua and $215,000 in Cold Spring Harbor.
There is no way any of these people deserve this kind of money.
LOL! Chris Christie is awesome. Get em Chris.
He gets it. He understands how the other side wants to play the game, and he’s a couple steps ahead of them.
>> The proposal infuriated many school leaders, who said it would lead to an exodus of talent ...
Sounds like an argument an “evil Capitalist” would make.
Waaaa. I hear the lib supers whining. Christie sure has some nads. I greatly admire this man and hope the people of NJ appreciate what they have in this governor.
He’s right, why should they be allowed such high salaries on the backs of the people of that state who have lost their jobs and homes? They sure do think they are more important than anyone else. Maybe some in other states, who make less, will come to NJ and take those jobs if some leave.
Every morsel of the bureaucracy will wage outright war on Christie and the overall effort will be to outlast him. Also, look for personal smears and wildly imagined charges against him—forgeries, doctored photos, ridiculous rumors, etc. Think of him as Joseph McCarthy or J. Edgar Hoover—half of all conservatives today probably believe the lies the KGB/libs circulated about THEM. There is no level of insanity Christie won’t face—if they have to, the operatives will move right in next door to him. They’ll attack his family. His chances are not very good.
The superintendents job-hop to the next-higher salary as soon as they are able. I doubt many of them stay for the full contract. Same thing with town administrators in NJ.
We need to cap superintendent salaries here in Pennsylvania because they are approaching 180-thousand dollars in some districts near where I live.
When taxpayers organize and win primary elections here in PA, the incumbent school board members impose new teacher contracts, extend existing ones and do the same for superintenents to lock in spending hikes before the taxpayer candidates have a chance to take their seats.
This is a smart move by Christie to prempt them.
>it would lead to an exodus of talent
Bwaa hahahahaa!!
Just like the rest of the country, there are a stack of resumes that would gladly take any of these “jobs” for a teacher’s starting salary.
Is this the only true conservative with national recognition? Is there a GOP candidate named as a prospective GOP prez candidate that comes close to accomplishing what Christie is attempting - and apparantly having success with?
Is there an official Chris Christie fan club. Can I be treasurer?
So that wasn’t a cat with its tail caught in the garbage disposal I heard earlier today.
You know, I'm all for letting the market decide salaries. However, salaries in the GOVERNMENT market is distorted by layers of drones and self-important unions.
In MY opinion there is no freaking way an administrator in public service should make this kind of money. For instance take this idiot I quoted from the article. This whiner is incensed with his possible pay reduction NOT because he thinks he does a good enough job worth a quarter-mil a year, but only because he's been doing it for 37 years and to treat him otherwise is just, well, wrong!!
Take a hike, bub. I'm sure some firecracker would love to take half your salary and do a bang up job.
He left them a work-around.That's not good.
The proposal infuriated many school leaders, who said it would lead to an exodus of talent and called for more time for debate.
Waaaaah! It b' fo' deh chillun's!
I understand that in some areas, the Teamsters have organized the school administrators.
That could certainly explain some of what’s going on.
D@mn. After reading this article, I need a cigarette...and I don’t even smoke!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.