Northport teachers to vote on contract settlement

Northport-East Northport teachers are scheduled to vote next week on a proposed union contract that could bring an end to more than two years of negotiations with the district.

The district’s attorney, John Gross, said Monday that the district and representatives of the United Teachers of Northport reached a settlement last Wednesday.

Teachers are scheduled to vote on the proposal on May 15. If the proposal passes, the board of education will then vote on whether to ratify the proposal.

Negotiations for a new contract began in February 2010. The teachers union has been working without a new contract since July 1, 2010, and the two parties have been at an impasse since December 2010.

The two sides had reached agreement on a proposed settlement in January, but that proposal was voted down by the teachers, union president Antoinette Blanck said.

Blanck said the prior proposal was rejected by teachers over concerns about the loss of several step increases, compensation for teachers at the highest step and step increases for teaching assistants.

“Those three areas were addressed to an extent in this new memorandum,” she said. “I have cautious optimism.”

The district and teachers had been scheduled next month to go into a fact-finding process, in which a third party examines both sides and makes nonbinding recommendations.