County Education Association

As head of Howard County's teachers union for six years, Joseph R. Staub Jr. oversaw three contract negotiations, watched one superintendent retire and another ousted and lobbied successfully for higher salaries. On Thursday, Staub will step down as president of the Howard County Education Association and return to the classroom as a social studies teacher at Long Reach High School in Columbia, where he taught before running for union president in 1999. "I've always considered myself as a teacher, first and foremost," he said.

The Maryland General Assembly has taken three actions that affect the Howard County school system, including one that would allow the student member on the Board of Education to vote on some matters. Another would enact a mandatory union fee for the majority of system employees, and a third would increase funding for construction projects. House Bill 513, which grants voting rights for the student member, and House Bill 881, which allows unions to charge a service fee to the majority of employees in the school system, require final approval by Gov. Martin O'Malley to become law. For the past year, the student voting rights issue has been hashed out within the school system.

The Board of Education, in contract negotiations with the Carroll County Education Association, plans to require all high school physicaleducation teachers hired after July 1991 to coach at least two sports.Do you think the school board should make coaching mandatory for high school phys ed teachers.? Do you think physical education training automatically makes those teachers more qualified to coach?

The Howard County school system has reached tentative agreements with the four unions representing the majority of its 9,000 employees. The school system and the four unions - American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Howard County Administrators Association and the Howard County Education Association, which has units for educational support professionals and teachers - have been negotiating since November. "I feel that it was a very collaborative process on both sides," said Sue Mascaro, director of staff relations and operations for the school system, who announced the tentative agreements at Thursday's school board meeting.

Two school employee unions have mutually recommended five of the 22 candidates vying for two seats on the Carroll County Board of Education. The candidates are running in Tuesday's nonpartisan primary and the top four vote-getters will compete in the November general election. The seats are held by Ann M. Ballard and Joseph D. Mish Jr., who are not seeking re-election. Carroll County Education Association, which represents teachers, and Carroll Association of School Employees, the union representing school secretaries and teaching assistants, recommended Lisa Breslin, Thomas G. Hiltz, James Earl Kraft, Stephen M. Nevin and Cynthia M. Parr.

Don't expect Howard County teachers to sign an agreement that will wipe out a negotiated 6 percent pay raise in their contract.Leaders of the Howard County Education Association are disturbed that the county's 1992 operating budget adopted by the County Council yesterday did not restore money for raises that County Executive Charles I. Ecker eliminated.The $270.3 million budget adopted by the council will raise property taxes 14 cents to $2.59 per $100 of assessed valuation.The Board of Education plans to invite the HCEA, the teachers' collective bargaining unit, to a renegotiation session sometime next month.

Loretta Hill of Westminster, a member of the Carroll County Education Association, has raised more than $15,400 for local charities through four cookbooks she's compiled since 1974.The cookbooks have benefited local organizations such as Carroll Hospice, the Northeast Social Action Program, the Carroll County Sexual Abuse Center and Carroll County General Hospital.Mrs. Hill recently retired after 31 years of teaching.Organization's comments: "She was a very dedicated teacher and is very concerned about her fellow citizens," said Cindy Cummings, president of the Carroll County Education Association.

State nurses support re-election of BonsackThe Political Action Arm of the Maryland Nurses' Association, MNA-PAC, has endorsed Del. Rose Mary Hatem Bonsack, a physician and Democratic candidate for re-election to the Maryland House of Delegates in District 34.According to the nurses' association, which represents Maryland's 55,000 registered nurses, Dr. Bonsack has been instrumental in the achievement of health care legislation in Maryland and is a consistent...

Negotiations between the Carroll County Board of Education and five employee unions are taking longer than anyone had expected.Both sides have agreed not to comment on the negotiations, which are due to resume today, but school board President Joseph D. Mish Jr. acknowledged yesterday they are not going well."

Teachers and other groups of Carroll County school employees would receive a 2 percent across-the-board raise under the terms of tentative agreements between two school employees unions and the Board of Education.The Carroll County Education Association, which represents about 1,300 teachers, sent the proposal to its members Monday after two months of negotiating with the school board bargaining team."I think it's the best we can get," said Ralph C. Blevins, president of the teachers union.

Carroll County Republicans will be voting for three of 10 candidates for Board of Commissioners in a contested primary election Sept. 12. The three GOP victors will run against three Democratic candidates in the general election. Although a 2004 voter referendum called for electing five commissioners by district, a decision by the state's highest court rendered that measure moot. Instead, commissioners will again be elected at-large in November. South Carroll residents were especially disappointed to not gain more representation in their district.

The $554 million operating budget for the coming school year proposed by Howard County Superintendent Sydney L. Cousin last week drew early praise from Board of Education members and the education and political communities. "I think what you are hearing is a board that is broadly satisfied with this budget," said Chairman Joshua Kaufman about the fiscal 2007 fiscal budget plan unveiled Thursday. "We look forward to working with our counterparts in the County [Council]." Cousin's plan would fund 130 new teaching positions; increase teachers' salaries by 3.5 percent; provide $70.1 million for special education, an increase of $4.8 million; spend $1.5 million to add all-day kindergarten to 10 elementary schools; and pay for $10 million in employee benefits.

To comply with new accounting rules, Howard County's next executive must put aside $50 million for retiree health benefits - more money than the entire local budget grew this year. The county's total liability is estimated at $400 million and growing, County Council members learned last week. The choices - paying the bill or eliminating the benefits - appear stark, but county officials are gathering information on the issue, said Sharon Greisz, the county finance director. State officials face the same situation, and they are looking at an estimated $20 billion bill.

To comply with new accounting rules, Howard County's next executive must put aside $50 million for retiree health benefits - more money than the entire local budget grew this year. The county's total liability is estimated at $400 million and growing, County Council members learned last week. The choices - paying the bill or eliminating the benefits - appear stark, but county officials are gathering information on the issue, said Sharon Greisz, the county finance director. State officials face the same situation, and they are looking at an estimated $20 billion bill.

As head of Howard County's teachers union for six years, Joseph R. Staub Jr. oversaw three contract negotiations, watched one superintendent retire and another ousted and lobbied successfully for higher salaries. On Thursday, Staub will step down as president of the Howard County Education Association and return to the classroom as a social studies teacher at Long Reach High School in Columbia, where he taught before running for union president in 1999. "I've always considered myself as a teacher, first and foremost," he said.

CARROLL COUNTY School employees to get 3% raises this year, '06 The Carroll County school system's nearly 3,000 unionized employees will receive 3 percent pay raises in each of the next two years, compensation for a wider range of extra-duty assignments and an increase in tuition reimbursement, according to the terms of two-year contracts that school board members signed last night with the representatives of five bargaining units. The contracts, which take effect July 1, also boost step and longevity increases - automatic raises built into salary scales.

The Howard County Education Association has agreed to renegotiate salaries for 2,300 teachers and administrators for the last year of their three-year contract, the association's president said yesterday.President James R. Swab said the association's representative council voted Tuesday night to grant a request by the superintendent and school board to reopen the salary discussions this month.Superintendent Michael E. Hickey said yesterday he was pleased with the association's decision. "Otherwise, the school board would have been required to act unilaterally to set a new salary schedule" for the fiscal year that begins July 1, he said.

Characterizing the months-long negotiations as "long and laborious" as well as "collaborative," the Howard County Board of Education and the Howard County Education Association have reached a tentative two-year contract agreement that would increase teacher salaries. Teachers would receive raises of 3 percent the first year and 3.5 percent the next. Many teachers also would be eligible for step increases - raises based on experience. School and union officials said yesterday at a news conference at the Board of Education building that salary increases were necessary to keep the state's top-performing school system competitive in the job market.

West Friendship fire station gets EMTs from county The nationwide squeeze for paramedics has hit home in West Friendship, where the town's volunteer Fire Department recently requested that Howard County provide a full-time position to ensure around-the-clock coverage at the station. Chief Joseph A. Herr of Howard's Fire and Rescue Services said the department was responding to a request from the station because it has been unable to get its own paramedics "on a consistent basis." But Herr said that whenever the station needed a paramedic in the past, it received one from the department.