City, striking Newton teachers ‘extremely close to settling contract,’ school committee says

NEWTON, Mass. — The Newton School Committee and the Newton Teachers Association are “extremely close to settling a contract” that would bring the lengthy teachers’ strike to an end, a city official said late Friday morning.

“The School Committee and NTA bargaining teams are extremely close to settling a contract. Although negotiations persisted throughout the night and did not pause until 6:00 AM this morning, the parties have not yet reached an agreement. We remain optimistic about the progress we’ve made towards a return to school on Monday,” a spokesperson for Newton Public Schools said in a statement. Both sides have been working extremely hard to get our kids and educators back in school. The parties have agreed to COLA increases for all members that honor our educators and paraprofessionals and are sustainable over the life of the contract. The remaining contractual issues to resolve are related to the flexibility the district seeks for its leadership to manage the structure of the school day and best serve students.”

The spokesperson added, “We also need to finalize a Return to Work agreement that supports a thoughtful transition back to school and ensures students receive services required by law. As a result of the strike action, the district has incurred, and will continue to incur, approximately $1.1M in costs related to compensatory services and court fees, and it is our responsibility to determine how those costs will be paid.”

The Newton Teachers Association said earlier in the morning that the Newton School Committee had “lost all integrity” and “no interest in healing rifts” after overnight bargaining talks aimed at resolving the strike ended without a deal being reached.

The school committee ended negotiations with striking Newton Educators around 6 a.m. without a return-to-work agreement in place, even though money was no longer an issue, according to the NTA.

Teachers’ demand for social workers in every school continues to be a stipulation that the committee won’t agree on, the NTA said. The NTA also claims that the committee is stalling talks by trying to secure greater management prerogative over educators.

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“School Committee Chair Chris Brezski lost all integrity yesterday. After Brezski publicly declared that money remained the only issue separating the NTA and school committee, the union significantly adjusted its financial proposal,” a spokesperson for the NTA said in a statement. “By 4 a.m., the financial proposals between the two parties were identical.”

As of late Thursday night, the committee maintained that money was the lone gap that needed to be bridged in talks with the teachers.

The NTA alleged the committee then attempted to weaken the agreements on social workers and alter other agreements affecting the working conditions of educators and the learning conditions of students.

“The school committee’s proposed return-to-work agreement attempted to extract more than $1 million from educators,” the spokesperson said. “The committee showed no interest in healing rifts or truly ending this strike – a strike that would not have occurred had the school committee settled this contract at any point during the 16 months of negotiations that preceded the strike vote.”

Teachers are prepared to settle a fair agreement and reasonable return-to-work agreement that “fosters the rebuilding of relationships across the school community,” according to the NTA.

This announcement from the NTA comes after the committee on Thursday voted to cancel February break to start making up for lost school days. The committee also said that classes would be canceled on Friday, February 2, the 11th day of classes students will have missed.

Attorneys for the Newton School Committee and the Newton Teachers Association are expected to appear in court Friday in response to an emergency motion filed by a Middles Sex Superior Judge Thursday to double fines for each additional day that the strike continues.

Gov. Maura Healey’s administration also wants the court to appoint a third party to facilitate a legally binding resolution between the NTA and the committee.

Negotiations between the teachers and committee are slated to resume at 1 p.m.

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