Mahomet-Seymour School Board member Meghan Hennesy asked the board to consider including a $1,000 bonus for all union-eligible employees and building-level administrators during the regularly scheduled board meeting in June.
Hennesy suggested that the money come from ESSER (Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief) funds. She said
ESSER funds continue to be provided through the American Rescue Plan (ARP) to school districts to help safely reopen and sustain the safe operation of schools and address the impact of the coronavirus pandemic.
The Mahomet-Seymour School District spent ESSR I and II funds on COVID-19 testing, additional custodial responsibilities, laptops for staff, Chromebooks for students, and SMARTboards for classrooms.
Hennesy’s suggestion came after school districts, such as Monticello, used ESSER funds to pay bonuses to staff with ESSER money. Florida’s Gov. Ron DeSantis said his staff will use ESSER funds to pay bonuses to teachers and principals.
Hennesy estimated that the bonuses would cost the district about $400,000 or 10-percent of Mahomet-Seymour’s allocation.
District Chief School Business Officer Heather Smith said the 2020-21 district funds had already been spent. Discussion on the 2021-22 budget and ESSER III funds are upcoming.
“That is where you would want to recommend something like this,” Smith said. “We can put it in and submit the budget. We don’t get to just spend it. We have to have it approved by ISBE before we can spend the money.”
The district said that teachers have been surveyed for suggestions on how to spend ESSER III money, which will be allocated prior to the 2021-22 school year.
Hennesy pulled her motion, which was seconded by Colleen Schultz, but Ken Keefe asked that it be placed on the July 19 board agenda.
According to Mahomet-Seymour board policy, whether or not the item is on the agenda is controlled by the board president, which at the time is Max McComb.
McComb said, “I am personally not opposed to considering payments and employee bonuses. I would like more than a spur of the moment, at the meeting, to think about that. I’d like to be able to have some time to ask staff, I’d like to investigate some ramifications of this. I’d like some clarification on who’s eligible under the language you’ve presented. There’s a lot of work that I would like to do on this, that we’re not going to get it done tonight.”
Smith said that one of those ramifications might be IMRF penalties for paying bonuses or compensation.
McComb said that he was also uncomfortable discussing pay negotiations in open session.
Hennesy said her suggestion was not a salary increase, but instead a bonus that an employee could turn down.
“I think what I’m hearing is that there is interest in pursuing this, and it would be money that would need to come out of the ESSER III funds, which we don’t even have a platform available yet to start entering and budget for ESSER III,” Superintendent Lindsey Hall said. “I’m not hearing that, this is going away, just that there’s a lot of ramifications and aspects of this to discuss.”
