1% of WHAT?

If administrators are getting a 1% raise....and the raise is a "pool" of 1% of administrator salaries for 2010-11...
But...but....that includes the salaries of 3 administrators that have left the building.
Why should their salaries be included in determining "the pool"....if new administrators are ineligible for raises???

Why, to boost their individual raises of course!

Think about it....the 3 administrators who have resigned made a combined $300,000.
1% of that is $3,000.
That means that the "raise pool" of  roughly $25,000 is high by $3,000
What a nice way to increase your raise by 13%

They must be learning from DeForest!

Updates on DeForest's Extreme Case of Salary Bloat

http://www.facebook.com/pages/DASD-Administrative-Bloat/147668358638705

Follow the DeForest Administrative Shenanigans at the Facebook link above

The DeForest Debacle: Self-Serving, Self-Perpetuating Opulence

Equity, Schmequity!
DeForest administrators' cries for salary equity are weak at best.  Does a doctor at John Hopkins earn the same as a doctor in some podunk community hospital?  We don't think so.  Does a police officer in a small midwestern village earn as much as a New York City cop?  We don't think so!  It doesn't make sense!

Equity has to be based on comparing apples to apples, not apples to pineapples!  You can't compare DeForest school employee salaries to the 16 Dane Co. school districts because they are so variable.  DeForest has an enrollment of 3249, while Dane Co. districts range from 800 kids to 24,800 kids.
Even the average enrollment of all Dane Co. districts is 34% higher than DeForest's enrollment.

Looking at enrollments, DeForest administrators do not
warrant pay at the same level as those in much larger districts

DeForest fits best in a group with 6 other Dane Co. districts:  Oregon, Waunakee, Stoughton, Monona Grove, McFarland, and Mount Horeb.  In addition to enrollment size, other factors including community housing market, per capita income, and student socio-economic factors must be considered.   We don't think DeForest did that.

Self-Perpetuating Opulence
These are tight times, people.  How can anyone --yes, including Exxon executives--consider themselves worthy of obscenely grandiose raises?  All around, people are having their incomes REDUCED!  Those relying on Social Security haven't seen an increase in 2 years, and may see a very slight increase in January 2012.  State, county, and municipal workers are seeing their take-home pay REDUCED by 8-10% as soon as Gov. Walkers gets his plan approved.  How can any individual take this without getting up and speaking their piece?

The "new" money that will be paid to DeForest administrators amounts to over $300,000 in cost.  For a district with a tax levy of about $21M, that means that these new raises will add at least a 1.4% increase to the tax levy.  And like some STDs, this is the gift that keeps on giving.  Salaries will only INCREASE!

What makes matters worse is that districts feed off of themselves.  If DeForest is allowed to award these excessive raises, then other school districts will just want more, which will result in DeForest administrators wanting even more!  It's one giant game of leapfrog.  At what point do we stop the madness?  Look...we get it.  These people manage our schools that teach our children.  It's an important job.  It deserves to be amply compensated.  But "amply" does not equate to "obscenely".

Here's a question:  just exactly how much time is being spent figuring out what the other guy is earning--and how to spin that into justification for raises-- instead of focusing on the educational outcomes of our kids?

Just as we need to raise the floor and lower the ceiling for teachers, we need to establish a cap for administrators as well.  You don't like ceilings for teacher pay?  Look...there can't be a one of you out there that can rationalize a kindergarten teacher or elementary school "Library Media Specialist" earning over $90,000 per year for 9 months work.  That's just plain insanity.  In fact...we offer this challenge....if you really think you can rationalize the merit of such a salary, then e-mail us at sp.eye1@gmail.com and we'll publish your argument...anonymously if you wish.

State leaders are so quick to put caps on spending.  You know what happens?  These people pay themselves first and take the cuts in supplies and services that directly affect our kids. Hello!  McFly!  Salaries and fringes account for as much as 80-85% of a school district's budget!  When is one of our well-compensated legislators going to push a bill that will places the caps on PAY, not supplies and critical services?  But we digress.

Let's look at how DeForest's "Dane Co. Market Salary Adjustment" has yielded:

District Administrator
DeForest's District Administrator, Jon Bales, is currently the 6th highest paid District Administrator in Dane County.  While Bales did not receive anything as part of the "market adjustment" increase, he already received a 5% increased (reported to be a 2% increase) for 2010-11. He now  earns $146,243, which is $4,000 per year more than the WELL-compensated Dr. Culver in Sun Prairie!  Dr. Culver runs a district with TWICE the number of students as DeForest, and has 2 more years experience than Dr. Bales.  Think Culver will be wanting more now?

Business Manager
The average salary of the 13 Dane Co. Administrators titled, "Business Manager" is $106,700. DeForest' Business Manager, Diane Pertzborn was earning $111,855 following a 5% increase for 2010-11. With this "Dane Co. Market Adjustment", she will earn (effective Jan.1, 2011) $118,580. Her salary previously ranked 8 of 13 and now will rank 6 of 13, just behind Sun Prairie's Phil Frei ($123,345). Pertzborn's salary previously was 4.8% above the Dane Co. average ($106,700) for Business Managers, and now will be 6.3% above average. Is that equity?

Human Resources (HR) Director

The average salary of the 7 Dane Co. Administrators titled, "Central Office Administrator, subtitle Human Resources" is $112,768. DeForest's HR Director, Vickie Adkins was earning $93,500 following a 5% increase for 2010-11. With this "Dane Co. Market Adjustment", she will earn (effective Jan.1, 2011) $115,000. Her salary previously ranked 7th out of 7 and now will rank 3rd of 7, just above Sun Prairie's Annette Mikula ($114,000). Adkins' salary previously was 15% below the Dane Co. average for HR Managers, and now will be 1.4% above average.   Keep in mind that only 7 school districts (Madison, Verona,  Sun Prairie ,  Waunakee , Middleton-Cross Plains, Stoughton,  De Forest) are large enough to even have a dedicated HR Manager

Director of Instruction
The average salary of the 25 Dane Co. Administrators titled, "Director of Instruction Manager" is $103,600. DeForest' Director of Instruction, Sue Wilson was earning $94,554 following a 5% increase for 2010-11. With this "Dane Co. Market Adjustment", she will earn (effective Jan.1, 2011) $112,181. Her salary previously ranked 16 of 25 and now will rank 10 of 25, just behind Sun Prairie's Alice Murphy ($113,200). Wilson's salary previously was 8% below the Dane Co. average ($103,600) for Directors of Instruction, and now will be 9% above average.

Director of Special Education

The average salary of the 13 Dane Co. Administrators titled, "Director of Special Education" is $107,900. DeForest's Director of Special Ed., David Perrodin was earning $96,700 following a 5% increase for 2010-11. With this "Dane Co. Market Adjustment", he will earn (effective Jan.1, 2011) $112,181. His salary previously ranked 11 of 13 and now will rank 4 of 13, about 3.5% less than Sun Prairie's Lisa Dawes ($116,200). Perrodin's salary previously was 9.5% below the Dane Co. average for Directors of Special Education, and now will be 4% above average.

High School Principal

The average salary of the 20 Dane Co. Administrators titled, "High School Principal" is $107,500. DeForest's HS Principal, Machell Schwarz was earning $98,145 following a 5% increase for 2010-11. With this "Dane Co. Market Adjustment", she will earn (effective Jan.1, 2011) $113,000. Her salary previously ranked 13 of 20 and now will rank 7 of 20, about $2,000 more than Sun Prairie's Lisa Heipp ($111,044). Schwarz' salary previously was 5.6% below the Dane Co. average for High School Principals, and now will be 7% above average.

Middle School Principal

The average salary of the 16 Dane Co. Administrators titled, "Middle School Principal" is $97,500. DeForest's MS Principal, Paul Herrick was earning $91,400 following a 5% increase for 2010-11. With this "Dane Co. Market Adjustment", he will earn (effective Jan.1, 2011) $103,371. His salary previously ranked 11 of 16 and now will rank 5 of 16.  This is still about $10,000 below the average for Sun Prairie's two middle school principals, Clark Luessman and Nancy Hery, but Sun Prairie is at the head of all Dane County Middle School Principal salaries!  Herrick's salary previously was 5.6% below the Dane Co. average for Middle School Principals, and now will be 6% above average.

 Elementary School Principal

The average salary for Dane Co. Administrators titled, "Elementary School Principal" is $90,950. The average pay of DeForest's elementary principals, Michael Finke, Ann Schoenberger, and Michael Weisensel was $90,000 following a 5% increase for 2010-11. With this "Dane Co. Market Adjustment", the average (effective Jan.1, 2011) will now be $94,300. DeForest previously ranked 9 of 16 for elementary principal pay and now will rank 6 of 16.  This average is $700 more than the average salary of Sun Prairie's seven elementary school principals.  DeForest elementary school principal pay previously was 1% below the Dane Co. average for Elementary School Principals, and now will be 4% above average. 

Can't See DeForest For The Greed

Confidential?  Yeah...we can see why they didn't
 want THIS document to ever see the light of day!

 The pressure is off of district administrators and the school board here in Sun Prairie, because of the shocking cajones of the DeForest Board of Education and DeForest Area School District Administrators.

While we're getting worked up --and justifiably so--- about our own district administration on the cusp of getting 1.6% increases in the midst of tight times, the DeForest Administration Team ---with the support of the Board of Education-- awarded themselves titannic raises under the guise of "Dane County Market Equity" adjustments. The raises are retroactive to January 1, 2011. For appearances sake--you just KNOW they'll spin this in budget documents--- their salaries are being frozen for 2011-12. Geeeee whiz! With those increases, they should be frozen permanently.

How much of raises are they getting, you ask? The AVERAGE salary increase since the 2009-10 school year (for which administrators received a whopping 5% increase) is 16%. For a group of 22 administrators, the lowest increase received was 5.1% and the highest 39.1%. The price tag for salary adjustments comes to an incredible $304,000! And that amount is an expense for EVERY future year, further compounded by future wage increases.

Simply...SHOCKING!

For the top 11 DeForest Administrators, the AVERAGE salary increase in dollars was $15,700 per year. That increase in pay amounts to $1300 per month! Many senior citizens on Social Security (who have not seen an increase in the past 2 years) earn less than $1300 per month TOTAL! These fat cats are getting that as a RAISE!

Questions abound in DeForest as early indications suggest that the board of education (school board) did not vote on these increases in open session.   That would be a clear violation of Open Meetings Laws.  We could find no documentation or agenda that suggested these raises were even considered, let alone a done deal.  We were, however, able to obtain a document that appears to have been leaked from within the school district.  The members of the DeForest Board of Education should be ashamed of themselves, to say the least. They'll be lucky if they don't get tarred and feathered right out of the community. Recall elections are the soup du jour this spring. We may be seeing a few (or all) board of educations members facing recall elections.

Clearly these folks have no clue as to how badly things could heat up for them. Sun Prairie taxpayers put the whammy on the school board here 2 years ago by voting to cut the tax levy by $2,000,000. That amount could pale in comparison to what DeForest community members could do at their annual meeting this summer.

Why is this such a poorly timed move? First of all, folks, the economy isn't exactly hopping along like an Energizer bunny. Second, the time is quickly approaching when state, county, and municipal workers' paychecks will be severely cut by Governor Walker's agenda. These ridiculous raises will be hitting people's pockets when they can least afford it.

One other problem this situation poses is that we could very quickly get into a game of keeping up with the Jones. Our administrators will see DeForest's raises and want similar bounty.

The DeForest Times reports the following:

[District Administrator Dr. Jon] Bales said the decision was based on a desire by the board to have every district employee compensated at a level of at least the average in the market. "Over the years, we've been able to accomplish that with support staff and teachers," he said. "The effort with administrators was exactly the same. It's been put off, frankly, for years, because it is a high-cost group. We wanted to do it last year, we didn't do it. We wanted to do it this year, we didn't do it. We implemented it mid-year because you only pay half of what that base increase would have been. While it looks like a dramatic sort of adjustment for some people, at the end of the day, they're paid an average wage in the county." "I don't discount the timing, I don't discount the pressures on the district, but that was built around a balanced budget before the new state budget."

And You Think OUR School Board has Brass Ones?

Come on!  Really?!?
Are you people nuts?
We all know that EVERY school district has a Phil who has his/her own pair of "our dough" pants.  Every school district budget has a pork-based foundation.  Let';s not forget how the evil Sun Prairie electors cut their school tax levy to the bone in 2009 ....only to find that the district STILL had a $1.3 MILLION dollar surplus.

Here's hoping that SOME brave group of DeForestonians stands up and cries "bullspit!".  ANYONE could easily make a case that the DeForest school board is grossly overstepping its authority.
The state of education is NOT going to progress here or anywhere until school districts across the land wake up and smell the coffee.
Of course, what's more infuriating is that the newspaper article itself appears to applaud the tactics of the school board, by stating that,

" The school board is authorized by state law to levy the amount of money they believe is needed to operate the schools. The vote by the electors at the annual meeting was only advisory."

You MIGHT want to read that statute a little more closely.  First mistake was suggesting that the vote of the electors is "advisory"!  Advisory? Really?!? REALLY?  We don't think so.

Read the article.