WATSONVILLE—The Pajaro Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees on Wednesday approved an agreement that increases every teacher’s yearly salary by $4,000, retroactive to July 1, 2021.
Teachers were not the only ones that benefited from the agreement, which was passed tentatively on Feb. 16.
Nurses, psychologists, speech-language pathologists and program specialists will receive a $2,000 raise, and get a $1,000 one-time payment.
Child development and Migrant Head Start employees are getting a one-time, off-schedule payment of $600, and teachers are getting a 6% increase.
Adult Education teachers are getting a 5% increase.
PVUSD Chief Business Officer Clint Rucker says that the increases will add $5.9 million to the 2021-22 budget, and around $5.8 million to ongoing years.
Much of that this year will be covered by Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief funds, Rucker said.
Budget projections for future years show that the district will be able to afford the increases for future years, Rucker says, which will be helped by increases to Average Daily Attendance funding expected in Gov. Gavin Newsom’s May budget revision.
PVUSD Assistant Superintendent of Human Resources Alison Niizawa had praise for the negotiators and the rapidity of the discussions.
“We were able to reach an agreement in a relatively short amount of time, so we’re proud of that,” she said.
Pajaro Valley Federation of Teachers (PVFT) President Nelly Vaquera-Boggs said the agreement is a “significant gain,” considering that the last increase on the salary schedule was in 2018 after mediation.
“This agreement to place an increase on the salary schedule closes our re-opener for the 2021-2022 school year,” she said. “It is a good base to work from as we prepare for a new master contract cycle as we close out our existing three-year 2019-2022 contract.”
The union will return to the bargaining table, she said, sometime later this year to talk about a new contract.
PVFT Chief Negotiator Radhika Kirkman called the agreement a “step in the right direction,” adding that many members are still waiting for their increases. Early Childhood Education teachers, she said, make 15 cents over the minimum wage.
“I hope to take that on as we go into contract negotiations,” she said.
