Board members approved salary and health care coverage increases for classified and administrative employees in Wednesday night’s Manhattan/Ogden regular public meeting.
However, Superintendent Bob Shannon and others appeared apologetic for the amount of these increases.
“It’s lower, I think, than any of us would prefer,” Shannon mentioned before a final board vote, “I don’t need to tell you about the difficulties of rolling into this budget year from last year and what it’s taken to do that. I told some others, I think we just need to hope, and see what we can do for better times ahead.”
Classified and administrative employees in the district that have been employed since this April will see a healthcare increase of 3 percent, while also receiving a salary increase of .45 percent.
The board also listened to reports by several department heads, including maintenance and transportation. Maintenance Director Keith Noll told board members the district’s ongoing thermostat issue, fueling complaints of hot and humid learning environments, was fixed as of Wednesday night.
A transportation update by Transportation Director Doug Messer also caught the attention of board members. Messer spoke about the current employment numbers of drivers, and their lack thereof.
“You’ll see that we are the number one user of overtime,” Messer told board members, “We’ve been that way for many years and we’ll continue to be. We have a huge demand to handle.”
Although the department is currently training 6 new drivers, Messer says the district is in need of at least 8 more to transport children to and from school and related activities.
Agenda items scheduled for USD 383’s next regular meeting on September 16th include a student transfer report, a celebration of Freedom Week report, and an Adult Learning Center/ Open Door Program annual report.
