Bill: Cut School Board Pay To $100 Per Meeting
TALLAHASSEE (CBSMiami.com/NSF) - Broward County School Board members have been under lot of fire lately. A state Grand Jury report blasted them for incompetence and cronyism. Their Superintendent said he was leaving. And now, a state lawmaker wants to cut their pay from $39 thousand a year to just $100 per meeting.
The measure, SB 7234, is not targeted at Broward, although with the highest school board salaries in the state, they have the most to lose. If the bill sponsored by GOP Senator Stephen Wise of Jacksonville becomes law, every school board member in the state would lose their salary, and instead, be paid $100 per meeting plus a travel allowance.
This is the second year Wise has promoted a bill to slash school board pay. The Senate will consider it Tuesday.
"Let me say this and I hope it's printed," Wise said Monday. "We are number one in something in Florida – salaries of school board members."
Critics say it is another attack on public schools by the Republican-dominated Legislature, but proponents argue it's a way of shifting dollars spent on board member salaries to fund classroom necessities.
Under the proposal, school board members would be paid $100 per meeting, with a cap of $2,400 per year. Travel expenses would also be reimbursed. Current law sets a minimum salary between $5,000 and $10,000 for school board members, but all school board members now make far more than that, with the amount differing depending on the county's population.
"We will be opposing that proposal because it's singling out one group of constitutionally elected officers who are part time and not singling out other constitutional officers and we think it's not fair to do that," said Florida School Boards Association Executive Director Wayne Blanton.
Legislative staff analysis of the bill cites a National School Boards Association study from 2007 that lists Florida as the only state which sets in law that school board members are paid as elected officials. The survey notes that stipends vary widely and that in New York City board members earned $15,000 in 2007.
"The average school board member salary in the United States is $100 a meeting," Wise said. "I just went with the average…some of them don't get paid at all."
There is no similar House proposal, though Wise said "there are ways to do it," without a House version.
