A marathon day of teacher contract talks with a federal mediator in Geary USD 475 ended after 9 p.m. Wednesday with the two sides….Junction City Education Association and Board of Education representatives, confirming they had reached a tentative agreement on 2015-2016 contracts.

But they won’t tell anyone publicly what they agreed on at this time.

Kansas Association of School Boards attorney and the lead negotiator for the USD 475 Board of Education,  David Shriver, said, ” JCEA will submit the Board’s proposal that was made today ( Wednesday ) to their membership for a vote.” When asked what that proposal was Shriver answered, “Until it’s voted on we’re not at liberty to release all that information.” When asked if that proposal included an average  six-and-a-half percent pay raise for teachers that had been offered some time ago by the Board during negotiations there was no clear answer. JCEA President Cathy Rankin added, “JCEA wants to be the first to be able talk to its members about what the proposal includes.”

When asked why negotiations took so long on Wednesday, stretching from morning through late evening, Rankin replied, “Because it did.” When asked if he had any thoughts on that Shriver replied, “No. Lot of items that some had not been talked about at all, and some still had a lot of significance to each side.”

The JCEA plan is to present the tentative agreement on a building by building basis to teachers in the school district.  Rankin said the JCEA might be able to release more information on the agreement after the teacher vote. She indicated they thought that might be completed by the end of the second week of October.

If the JCEA membership approves the tentative agreement, it would then go to the USD 475 Board of Education for that entity to consider final ratification that would allow a new contract to be implemented.

Contract talks have been at impasse in USD 475 since August 4. So far this school year teachers have been working under the 2014-15 school year contract.

If the tentative agreement gains final approval from both the teachers and school board that would avoid the need to move to a fact finding process as the next step following the impasse.

During the mediation session on Wednesday the two sides were in the same room briefly, but mostly the JCEA negotiators operated in the meeting room near the front entrance to the Devin Center, while the members of the BOE negotiating team, including some administrators, met in an upstairs conference room. The mediator then went back and forth between the two sites with information.