Bellevue: Another bargaining day without resolution

Negotiators for the Bellevue School District and its striking teachers union ended another day of bargaining without reaching an agreement.

The two sides tried Wednesday to resolve differences about the use of a common curriculum, but didn't address teacher pay, where the district and the union remain far apart, according to district officials. Bellevue teachers began the strike Tuesday on what would have been the first day of classes.

Teachers and administrators remain at odds over what the district can afford to pay teachers and whether Bellevue is falling behind the region's other districts in salaries.

For first-year teachers, Bellevue offers the second-highest pay rate in the state — only Marysville pays more. But teachers say they need an increase because the cost of living in Bellevue is much higher than in Marysville.

On the picket lines Tuesday, veteran teacher Kathy Adams, who's taught at Bellevue High School for 30 years, said she's striking for the young people entering the profession.

"In order to retain the best teachers, we have to give them pay they can afford to live on," Adams said.

The district has offered a 3 percent pay raise over the proposed three-year contract. Combined with this year's 5.1 percent cost-of-living raise from the state, teachers' salaries would rise 8.1 percent.

The teachers union is asking for 9 percent in raises. Teachers will also get a 5.1 percent increase to their base salary this year in a cost-of-living adjustment.

The district says that it can only meet the teachers' demands by making other cuts to its budget and warns that it would have to lay off 63 teachers and raise class sizes an average of two students.

It also says it would have to end the seven-period day at high schools and middle schools — the state only funds five periods — and make cuts to other programs, including electives such as art and music.

"Teachers seem to be under the misunderstanding that there's a pot of money we can tap into. That couldn't be further from the truth," said School Board President Peter Bentley. Bentley noted that the district has already cut nearly $5 million from its $164 million 2008-09 operating budget and said deeper cuts would threaten the district's quality of education.

"We've gone as far as we can on the money," he said. "That's why we're at an impasse."

But union leaders say the district should rethink its priorities. Dale Folkerts, spokesman for the Bellevue Education Association, said the district could cut administrators, delay purchasing new curriculum materials and return some curriculum coaches to the classroom to hold down class size and free up money for teacher salaries.

Folkerts said the average teacher pay in Bellevue — $58,500 — is below six other districts, including Everett, Marysville and Mercer Island. He said the district isn't paying experienced teachers enough to stay, which is causing a high turnover rate.

Teachers on the picket line Wednesday said they were skeptical of the district's claim that it didn't have money for larger raises.

Cassandra Hahn, a second-grade teacher at Stevenson Elementary, said, "In the past they've said they didn't have it and they did. There's a lack of trust on that issue," she said.

Lynn Thompson: 206-464-8305 or lthompson@seattletimes.com