Strike may cost district $900,000

Published 9:00 pm Monday, May 17, 2004

Months after the fact, strike-related costs in the Marysville School District have continued to rise and could reach $900,000, according to a new financial report.

The Marysville School Board learned Monday night that the 49-day strike – the longest in state history – was far more expensive than estimates in November originally indicated.

The board voted to resubmit its 2003-04 budget to the state Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, reflecting the $2.6 million in unbudgeted expenses it could make this year. In the budget it adopted in August, the district expected to spend $81.4 million. The revised budget seeks authority to spend up to $84 million.

The district’s reserves going into next year are expected to be a dangerously low $1.8 million.

Within the revised budget is the $900,000 in strike costs.

“No one wins in a strike,” said Ron Young, a school board member. “You just look at what your losses are.”

No breakdown of the figures was available Monday. Attorney and security costs made up the majority of a previous report indicating strike costs at more than $400,000.

Some of the big-ticket items to emerge since then were approximately $200,000 in unemployment costs for classified workers, such as teachers assistants and bus drivers, during the strike. It also costs about $57,000 in extra pay for administrators and overtime for classified workers for each of the district’s two Saturday school sessions, said Jim Baker, the district’s financial director.

Those costs weren’t known in the original estimates because the district and the teachers’ union had not yet reached a contract setting the calendar.

Marysville has been hit hard financially this year. Besides the strike, the district has faced a sharp enrollment decline. The enrollment losses, which could continue into the fall, forced the district to send out more than 50 layoff notices to teachers last week for the next school year.

The strike-related costs do not include the $340,000 buyout of former Superintendent Linda Whitehead, who reached the settlement in March. The buyout pays her $170,000 this year and $170,000 next year.

Other extra expenses included nearly $570,000 in higher-than-expected grants that had to be spent this year, another $600,000 in grants that were carried over from last year and $140,000 an arbiter ruled the district had to pay teachers over a disputed work day in February of 2003.

Interim Superintendent Paul Sjunnesen said he has not encountered such an unusual budget scenario since he became a school administrator in 1967. “I have never seen this situation but then I have never been through this length of a strike before,” he said.

In other action, the district approved a separate contract with Larry Nyland, its new superintendent, who is scheduled to begin in July. He will be paid for up to 14 days and $7,000 for time he spends in the district working on the transition with Sjunnesen.

His three-year contract was not available Monday night because it had not been signed by all school board members. It is expected to be available today.

Reporter Eric Stevick: 425-339-3446 or stevick@heraldnet.com.