Lititz Record Express

              T H E R E S S
SER VING THE WAR WICK AREA FOR N E AR L Y A CENTUR Y
97th Year
E s t a b l is h e d A p r i l , 1877, a s T h e Sn n b e ;m
(C o n so lid a te d w ith T h e l l t i t z R e c o rd , 19371 Lititz, Lancaster County, Penna. 17543, Thursday, September 6,1973
10 c e n t s a C o p y ; $4.00 p e r y e a r b y
. w ith in L a n c a s t e r C o u n ty 16 PA G E S NO. 24
Teachers’ Strike Canceled in 11th Hour’ Decision
All queued up for the first day of school,
these youngsters at the Lititz Elementary
School waited in a morning fog for the
doors to open.
Police Ratify
Agreement
With Borough
The borough Police Depart­ment
has ratified an agreement
with Boro Council that includes a
six percent cost of living pay
increase for officers in the top
bracket, and a six percent cost of
living increase, plus a three
percent increase for other of­ficers.
The present classification
system for salaries of borough
employees will be used, but
Council agreed to consider a
change in the system for the
following year, and to use June as
a basis for consumer price index
in determining cost of living
increases, since discussions on
the agreement are started in
June.
The agreement also allows a
four weeks vacation after 20
years on the force, changed from
four weeks after 25 years. It
allows two weeks vacation
through 10 years on the force,
three weeks during 11 to 20 years.
The agreement also allows
policemen to live outside the
borough limjts, if they are within
two and a half miles of police
headquarters, and permits them
to request approval to live up to
five miles from police
headquarters. The old agreement
mandated that policemen must
live within the borough limits.
The police department had
been asking for a 10 percent
salary increase, and a 40 hour
work week. However, the
borough voted to continue the 45
hour work week.
Hard to believe that summer’s over. This pooch couldn't
believe his buddies were going back to school, so he came
along to investigate.
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GRAND
PRIZE
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FOOTBALL
CONTEST
Beginning This Week!
GUESS THE SCORE OF THE
WARWICK GAME
$25.00 (Lititz Shopping dollars)
TRIP for 2 to MIAMI
and the ORANGE BOWL
SEE PAGE 2
FOR DETAILS
One-Year Contract
OK’d, Salaries Up
Wmi
Meeting at the eleventh hour
for the second year in a row,
Warwick Education Association
cancelled plans for a strike and
ratified a one-year contract for
1973-74 Wednesday morning,
about 15 minutes before school
was scheduled to open.
Schools were open on schedule
Wednesday morning, with
teachers back in their
classrooms.
The School Board has called a
special meeting for tonight
(Thursday) to vote on ratification
of the contract. Ground rules for
negotiations in this district
require that the WEA ratify a
contract first, and then the School
Board may vote on it. Exact time
of the meeting had not been set at
press time.
The WEA had voted Tuesday
night to strike, in a special
meeting at the Rec Center, but
counter-acted this vote Wed­nesday
morning after their
negotiators met with School
Board officials in a late night
session Tuesday that ran into the
early hours of Wednesday
morning.
According to Richard Pohner,
chief negotiator for the WEA, a
strike headquarters had been set
up in a private garage, a
telephone installed, and picket
signs made.
“Picket captains had been
assigned to picket all five
schools, to convey the message
that we don’t want the schools to
open,” Pohner said.
He said the WEA had “almost
100 percent” backing, that 144
people, include a few non­members,
had voted to strike.
The WEA represents 190 teachers
in the district, and its mem­bership
roster includes 140
members, he said.
“Last year our total mem­bership
was only 144,” he said.
“We did good in getting people
out this year. Little old ladies who
wouldn’t dream of doing this last
year were with us,” he said.
He said a number of parents of
students turned up at the Rec
Center Tuesday night to help
make picket signs.
“The only reason we didn’t
strike was because we settled on
an agreement Tuesday night,”
Pohner said.
Agreement included throwing
out the proposed two-year con­tract,
which would have can­celled
a grievance procedure
during the second year of the
contract. As the one-year con­tract
now stands, the grievance
clause followed last year remains
in operation.
This grievance procedure was
one of the major hang-ups in
settling the contract, both School
Board and WEA negotiators said.
In effect, it gives teachers the
right to object to School Board
policies other than those included
in collective bargaining.
Collective bargaining includes
salaries, tuition reimbursement
for post-graduate credits, and
other fringe benefits. Teachers
also wanted the right to have a
voice in policies like size of
classrooms, curriculum, hiring of
substitute teachers, etc.
John Evans, chief negotiator
for the School Board, said that to
the best of his knowledge,
Warwick is the only school
district in the county that has a
grievance procedure in its
contract, and added that he has
never seen any other labor
contract with such a grievance
clause.
Evans said the School Board
can change policies unilaterally
(by one side) and the WEA has no
vote on these changes. However,
he said, any contract item can
only be changed by negotiation
between the two parties.
He said the grievance
procedure, which permits
teachers to object to any
changes, “only got into the
contract” in the last two years.
“We (School Board) have been
trying all along to get the
definition of the grievance clause
back to where it was and be in
step with the rest of the county,”
Evans said.
Pohner said the WEA had of­fered
three compromises to the
grievance procedure, but that the
School Board had turned these
down.
The two-year contract, he said,
would have done away with the
procedure in 1974-75, he said.
“The big thing,” he said, “is
that we will not lose the
grievance. If the School Board
wants it out, they’ll have to get it
out—we’re keeping it.”
An outcome of the negotiations
was the incorporation in the new
contract of a new meet and
discuss system “ to handle
problems not in the contract,”
Pohner said.
“The new system,” he said,
“takes a lot of things out of the
control of the superintendent and
establishes a balance between
the School Board and the
teachers.”
Elaborating further on the new
meet and discuss system, Evans
said regularly scheduled
meetings will be held each
month, and will be chaired
alternately by the chairman from
each group.
He said each party will appoint
four members, one of them to be
chairman. The membership can
change throughout the year,
depending on issues under
discussion. For instance, he said,
issues concerning personnel from
the high school would be ap­pointed
to sit in on discussions
concerning the high school, etc.
In former years, meet and
discuss sessions were held
“haphazardly,” he said,
whenever chairmen of both
groups mutually agreed to meet
and could get together. He said
formerly meetings were only
called when someone had a
problem.
He said a meet and discuss
committee for department heads,
not included in collective
bargaining, has been in operation
for several years. This com­mittee
worked with the WEA in
setting up the extra-curricular
pay scale, he said. He added that
the committee has been very
successful.
Salary increases in the new
contract raise the salary of new
teachers in the district to $7100
and $7200, the difference
depending on their experience
and credentials.
It gives an $800 increase to
teachers now at their maximum
salary, on the top rung of the pay
scale. It raises the top salary of
teachers with a bachelor’s degree
Local Man, Son
In Accident
A local man and his son
escaped serious injury in a two-car
accident on Route 322, a half
a mile west of Chestnut Hill Road
in Honeybrook Township at 12:15
p.m. Saturday.
According to Downingtown
State Police a car operated by
Robert Gathercole, Barrages
Trailer Park, Honeybrook,
traveling east on Route 322
swerved over into the west bound
lane of traffic in order to avoid
hitting a dog that ran in front of
the car.
The Gathercole vehicle hit the
left front fender of a car driven
by Barry Smith, 513 Spring Ave.,
Lititz, traveling west. Smith’s
son, Jeffrey was a passenger in
the car. -
Trooper Morgan Swisher of the
Downingtown State Police in­vestigated.
Damage to the Smith
car was estimated at $600 and
damage to the Gathercole vehicle
at $500. According to police there
were no prosecutions.
fit This Issue. . .
Business Directory 13
Church News 12
Classified Ads 14,15
Editorial Page 4
Sports Section 6,7,8
Women’s 10
The sign on the door says "Boys”, but the
girls didn’t seem to mind. These
youngsters were all waiting for the doors to
Xtititz R e c o rd E x p r e s s P h o to s
open Wednesday morning at the Lititz
Elementary School.
(at the 13 year level on the pay
scale) to $12,600, and that of
teachers with a master’s degree
(at the 14 year level) to $13,700.
This includes $400 difference
between a bachelor’s degree and
a bachelor’s degree plus 24
credits, and a $700 difference
between a bachelor’s and
master’s degree.
The tuition reimbursement
clause of the contract offers $150
a year for teachers who have
accumulated up to 15 credits, and
$250 a year to teachers with 16 or
more credits.
Pohner said the WEA had voted
down the board’s offer because it
was “too low,” compared with
rising cost of college credits.
“But this was not a major
stumbling block,” he said.
Dr. H. Dale Winger, superin­tendent
of schools, said Wed­nesday
morning that the teachers
had met in the high school
cafeteria and ratified the new
contract about 7:45 a.m.
He said the district was
planning to open and operate the
schools Wednesday regardless of
whether teachers showed up.
He said the district had a plan
to handle students, even if
teachers went out on strike, but
declined to say what that plan
was.
“Our position was that we were
never officially notified that the
teachers would not be at work,”
Dr. Winger said. “I had no word
about it, so we had to go ahead,”
He did say, however, that he
was aware of the pending strike
actions being taken, although he
had no official word.
He said he was “not worried”
about the pending strike, but
thought the matter “would
resolve itself.”
He said buses operated on
schedule Wednesday, “as far as
he knew,” with little confusion.
He said a few buses were in
operation Tuesday for non-public
school children.
This will be the fourth year
Warwick has operated under a
contract, and each year, a
mediator has had to be called in
to settle differences.
Four years ago, before Act 195,
the School Board agreed on a
“mutual understanding” con­tract,
Evans said. He said he
himself spent 165 hours “across
the table” in negotiations on this
contract.
The following year, Act 195
came into effect, mandating that
School Districts must negotiate a
contract.
Last year a contract was not
signed until early on the morning
that school was scheduled to
open.
Evans said he had hoped for a
two-year contract this year to cut
down on the amount of time spent
on re-negotiating.
“We spend too much time in
negotiations that could be put to
better use on education,” he said.
Crossing guards were back at their posts
on Wednesday morning as schools in the
Warwick School District opened their
doors for another term.