The Hillsborough school district has reached a tentative settlement with the union representing the district’s support employees, who include security officers.

HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY – The Hillsborough School Employees Federation and Hillsborough County Public Schools have reached a tentative agreement for both the 2017-18 and 2018-19 school years.

Under the agreement, most employees represented by the HSEF union would receive a salary increase of about 6 percent, plus a one-time bonus.

The agreement also places an extra focus on school security, which is a shared priority for both the union and the school district. School security officers will begin at a higher starting salary and existing officers will receive a higher base salary, compared with previous years. The district will also pay for the full cost of certain health-care premiums, uniforms, and fingerprinting for all HSEF-represented employees during both school years.

HSEF represents support employees in the areas of transportation, student nutrition services, maintenance, security, and custodial services.

“This is exciting for HSEF members, our represented employees, and our district. This added compensation is going to make a real difference for our employees, who work so hard to support students every day. Now that we have a tentative agreement, we’re able to focus more on what we’re all here to do, and that’s help students succeed,” HSEF President Iran Alicea said.

The tentative agreement delivers on a commitment from district leaders: Pursuing options for higher employee pay, while at the same time responsibly cutting expenses to end a budget deficit that stood at $130 million just three years ago. The state’s increase of just 47 cents per student to flexible funding in 2018-19 made the picture even more challenging, but both groups remained focused on a solution.

“We were really thrilled to work as partners with HSEF, with the idea that we all needed to get our district to a place where the finances will work long-term. And once we had that long-term, stable plan in place for our students, we were able to create the conditions to offer more pay and benefits for our amazing employees,” Superintendent Jeff Eakins said.

The tentative agreement now must be ratified by HSEF’s members and approved by the Hillsborough County School Board.

Hillsborough Schools | School Security | School Union | Education | Tampabay News

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