A special impasse hearing will take place at Orange County Public Schools Tuesday, March 5 regarding a new contract for teachers in the district.
Orange County Public School teachers will receive a “historic” 9% salary increase under the new contract.
At stake at the impasse hearing will be whether the school board will also raise teachers’ health insurance premiums by 64%.
Clinton McCracken is Orange County Classroom Teachers Association president and said this increase would be detrimental to most teachers and their families.
“They keep mentioning that for employees it's only a $646 increase. But they're leaving out a significant part of their proposal, which is employee plus family. And we believe that families matter. And for Plan B, for example, it's a $3,460 increase. For Plan C, it's a $2,709 increase for employees plus families,” said McCracken.
In an email sent to McCracken, the district said it's only a 64% percent raise in insurance premiums for some teachers. And this premium increase is the first in four years. Read over the plan options teachers have here.
Still, McCracken said most Floridians will see their insurance premiums jump by about a sixth of this.
“Just to put it in perspective, for example, it's 64%, average increase, the national average increase is 7%,” said McCracken.
The impasse hearing is open to the public and can also be streamed online starting at 9:30 am.
McCracken said he tried to get the meeting time changed as teachers will be in class at that time. He said teachers in the union will be wearing red in solidarity.
He’s encouraging families of teachers and other members of the public to attend the impasse hearing instead.
In a statement, the district said teachers and the general public are welcome to attend the meeting in person or to stream it online.
Here's the full statement from the district: "The School Board members do want to hear from teachers. This is a quasi-judicial hearing much like a court hearing, and because of this there won’t be any public comment. That’s why during this most recent School Board Meeting, board members specifically asked for people to email their questions to them to be asked at the hearing."
The meeting can be live-streamed here on Tuesday, March 5 at 9:30 a.m.
Watch the district's press conference on the health insurance premiums, and much more related to the impasse here:
