Pueblo City Schools address budget increases for administration funding amid teacher strike

The Pueblo Education Association continues to strike for a third day Wednesday as a deal has not been reached with Pueblo City Schools.

Teachers maintaining they want a 2 percent cost of living increase for the current school year.

“The reason we’re here is we feel we haven’t been given our fair share of the budget,” Terry McCanne, a 4th-grade teacher said.

Even though a fact finder said a 2 percent cost of living increase is possible, the district said it’s not.

“There’s no question that we desire to give them more. It’s just a matter of that not being good financial planning for us when we’re looking into the future,” Dalton Spouse, spokesperson for District 60 said.

The district said the increase would have to come out of the budget reserve, which acts like a savings account.

Chief financial officer for the district, David Horner said they’re already $3.5 million coming out of the district’s savings this year for primarily, salary increases.

Looking over the budget, the administration job category increased more than 22 percent since 2014, while the teaching and instruction job category has increased 4 percent.

“I think part of it is we have been filling some positions that have been vacant over the last couple of years,” Horner said.

Horner added as enrollment has declined, teaching positions have gone away.

Comparatively, the administration job category takes up a smaller percentage of the budget, than teaching salaries do.

“Being that it’s a very small percentage of our budget, when you add one position, it’s a large percentage increase,” Horner said.

Horner also added teaching positions can be found in other categories of the budget like student support, general administration and special education.

Now a bargaining meeting is in the works with the district and the union.

“They seem to just be dragging their feet. We need to get this issue resolved,” Suzanne Ethredge, president of the Pueblo Education Association said.

The union posted on their Facebook page Wednesday night saying they requested a meeting with the district Thursday morning to bargain a settlement.

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According to the post, the union said the district was “unable to get a team together until Saturday.”