Phoenixville Board OKs 2-Year Teacher Pact, Sets Nov. 21 Public Hearing for $3.5M Land Purchase

The 30-acre property at 622 Hares Hill Road in East Pikeland that the Phoenixville School District is considering buying for $3.5 million.

Perhaps the two most important things discussed by the Phoenixville School Board last night were largely absent from the night's agenda.

The more immediate, but more transient development, was the unanimous adoption of a two-year teacher contract. It was not on the online agenda checked just 90 minutes before the 7 p.m. meeting but had magically appeared on the printed agenda when the meeting began.

After the meeting, Superintendent Alan Fegley has few details to share.

He said health care provisions remained unchanged, although new language allows teachers to opt out.

The raises contained in the contract, not the same for all but contained in the various salary steps, average out to 2.7 percent in each of the two years of the pact, Fegley said.

In the first year of the contract, the raises do not go into effect until the second pay period in January. In the pact's second year, the raises go into effect in the first pay period of December, 2021.

Tammy Kurtz, president of the Phoenixville teachers union,

thanks the school board Thursday night for its work on

negotiating a new contract.

The contract was arrived at after the school board rejected a fact-finders report in October that, had it been adopted, would have formed the spine of the contract.

The Phoenixville Area Education Association voted in favor of the contract on Nov. 11.

Two veteran board members whose terms expire at the end of next month, Kevin Pattinson and Ken Butera, both expressed disappointment that the contract was not for a longer period.

Tammy Kurtz, a physical education teacher and president of the teachers' union, expressed the same wish for a longer contract.

As for the other matter, the purchase of a 30-acre property at 622 Hares Hill Road in East Pikeland, that was not on the agenda at all.

But the matter of purchasing the new property, first raised publicly more than a year ago, came up during the Building and Grounds Committee report.

The board has been negotiating with the property owner for the purchase 29.5 acres bounded by Route 724, Route 23 and Hare’s Hill Road in East Pikeland.

The price has dropped from $4 million to $3.5 million, said Fegley.

The district’s eventual plans for the property are to build a new elementary school due to the district’s continually rising enrollments.

Last night, Fegley said the district's enrollment continues to grow. This year, the student count is 105 higher than the previous school year.

Butera said the district's buildings are currently about 80 percent full.

Fegley told the board current projects show the district being 400 to 600 seats short of its current capacity in just three to five years.

He also said that although East Pikeland Township had expressed interest in purchasing the East Pikeland Elementary School building at 1191 Hares Hill Road that the new school would replace, appraisals put the price too high for the township's taste.

Plans to expand and renovate that building were killed by the township zoning hearing board in 2012 after 17 months of hearings.

A public hearing on approving the property purchase is planned for next Thursday, Nov. 21 at 7 p.m. in the administration building, 386 City Line Ave. The board intends to vote at the meeting that follows the public hearing.

Board member Lisa Longo said while she supports the purchase, she feels the public hearing should have been scheduled earlier to allow the residents more time to digest the information to be presented there.

"A lot of the public will be hearing this information for the first time just literally 15 minutes before we vote," Longo argued. 

But board member Blake Emmanuel said while she sees the point, the school board has been negotiating and discussing the matter for 18 months.

Not only is the property owner eager to sell, she said, the Nov. 21 meeting is the last voting meeting of the existing board. The new board members will be sworn in next month, and it could take even longer to bring them up to speed on the matter, Emmanuel said.

"I see what you're saying, but I think the pros outweigh the cons," she said.

And with that, I give you the Tweets from last night's meeting:

New Teacher Pact, Land Purchase Looms