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Beloit Turner administrators to get raise

BELOIT TOWNSHIP — The Turner School District will lose one administrative position, but the remaining administrators will get a 2.5 percent increase in salary and benefits in the coming school year.

The school board Monday voted 5-2 in favor of the raise.

The district has eliminated the assistant superintendent position held by Bill Beckley. Beckley will retire at the end of the month.

Turner schools will save $70,000 by eliminating the position and restructuring its administrative team, according to a news release from the district office.

The decision wasn’t an easy one, more than one board member said.

It was the second meeting for board member Jim Olson, who was elected in April. He described the talk about administrative raises as contentious.

Olson and board member Rodney Jordan were against any pay increases for administrators, they said.

They also were in favor of delaying the decision until fall, when the district would have more information about how much money it will get from the state.

Jordan said now is not the time, economically, to give such a raise.

“I’m embarrassed that we gave raises this year,” Jordan said.

Administrators deserve a raise, but taxpayers in the greater Beloit area can’t afford it this year, Jordan said.

The teachers this year will get a 3.9 percent total package increase per the contract signed last summer.

The board Monday also approved a 40-cent hourly wage increase for support staff.

The board also:

-- Approved an offer to purchase 40 acres just north of the middle/high school complex.

The parcel is the last one left that’s contiguous to the district, Business Administrator Brad Boll said.

The district has offered $6,600 per acre for the parcel for a total of $264,000.

The district eyed the same parcel in 2008. At the time, voters turned down a $2.5 million referendum question that included $800,000 to buy the same property.

-- Accepted a $65,000 grant to start an alternative graduation program for students who are at risk of not graduating, Boll said. The district had applied for $80,000 to start the program. The grant will cover salary and benefits for a teacher as well as equipment, he said.

The program will start in the fall.