BY MIKE CETERA
Given the PR problems the East Aurora School District has had, it would have served the School Board well to have waited to approve a new teachers contract. Instead, its members approved a deal on Monday without ever having seen the final contract.
"The administrators did a great job of negotiating with the teachers union," Vice President Bob McCue said. But if the board was given only "broad brush strokes" of what was in the contract, as one board member said, how can McCue be sure negotiations went well, particularly for the taxpayers?
Maybe there is a rush to get this deal done. If there is, nobody explained clearly why waiting until all board members had a chance to read the contract was unacceptable.
This isn't to say that the contract is a bad one. When you look at the percentage increases, the contract appears to be on par with what other area districts recently have done. See here (bottom left of page) and here.
And, it's not like East salaries are out of line. Still, how can you expect the public to trust you if you vote on spending a ton of money without having studied exactly what you're paying for?
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