Report: 300+ RCSD Employees Each Earn $99K or More

Rochester, NY – A new study of school district salaries finds more than 300 Rochester City School District employees earning six figures, a far larger number than in the comparably-sized Buffalo district. The study was done by the Albany-based Empire Center for New York State Policy.

Kent Gardner of the local Center for Governmental Research says you'd have to dig back into the history of teacher salaries to establish for certain the discrepancy between Rochester and Buffalo that now finds more than 300 Rochester school employees earning six figures, compared to just 67 in Buffalo. But he believes it likely goes back to the late-1980s increase in teacher salaries negotiated by teachers' union head Adam Urbanski and former superintendent Peter McWalters, which set Rochester salaries on an upward trajectory compared to Buffalo.

District spokesperson Tom Petronio says the district must remain competitive when it comes to teacher salaries if the school system wants to attract top candidates to Rochester. He says the school district is revamping its pay system in cooperation with the Rochester Teacher's Association so that teachers making top salaries are making the biggest difference for the city's kids.

Union leader Urbanski argues that only 13 of those employees are teachers, the rest of the high income earners are not members of his union. Urbanski says salaries for administrators at the central office are recommended by the Superintendant to the school board. And he says additional administrator salaries are negotiated by the administrators union.

CGR's Kent Gardner says there's systematic pressure that pushes salary levels up: as teachers' unions negotiate higher pay, the union that represents administrators has to push for its own higher pay levels to keep pace. Gardner says once the pattern of salary increases starts to build, it's almost impossible to rein in - and that's important to remember at negotiation time.

Gardner says it can be difficult to strike a balance that maintains healthy salary levels for teachers, and for the administrators who work directly with the superintendent.

Gardner says nearly all the district's employees are covered by collective bargaining through either the teachers' or administrators' unions. Only a small number of administrators work directly for the superintendent, and they too need competitive salaries so the superintendent can lure them to central office and away from the job guarantees that come with union employment.