The Buffalo, New York, school board’s decision to end a $5 million set-aside for plastic surgery coverage for the district’s teachers is on hold — meanwhile officials will have to search elsewhere to find savings to cover a $10.5 million deficit.
The Buffalo Teachers Federation took the issue to court after the school board voted in June to eliminate the cosmetic surgery rider, which the union says covers the cost of surgeries for car accident victims, skin peels for cancer patients and other urgent needs.
But it also covers face lifts, tummy tucks, breast implants, hair removal and massages, all on the taxpayer’s dime.
Originally intended as a cost-cutting measure, the board amended its resolution to shift the $5 million to pay for raises. But still the case went to court.
On June 28, New York State Supreme Court Justice Tracey A. Bannister granted a temporary injunction allowing the cosmetic surgery rider to continue until August and forbidding the school district from “terminating the cosmetic surgery provision of the parties’ collective bargaining agreement, pending disposition of the grievance and arbitration.”
Simply put, removal of the rider is on hold until an arbitrator makes a final decision on the union’s grievance or the school board rescinds its action.
Union balks on giving up rider
Barbara Seals Nevergold, an at-large member of the Buffalo school board, says she wants the cosmetic surgery rider gone, but she disagreed with the way the board went about it.
“I voted against the resolution to eliminate the cosmetic rider, not because I support the few staff who take advantage of this benefit — many teachers are not in support of the rider — but because the Board should not make decisions to unilaterally modify a labor agreement,” Nevergold told Watchdog.org.
“I’m not sure what motivated the administration and [school] board who negotiated the last contract with the Union to allow this rider but it has been a flash point as an example of use of funds that would be better spent on the educational needs of the district’s students,” Nevergold said. “Even the union leadership has stated that they are ready to give up the rider as part of the negotiations on a new contract.”
But not just yet.
BTF President Phil Rumore told Watchdog that because of the school board’s attempt to remove the rider without a full contract negotiation, persuading his members to go along with eliminating the provision in the next contract will be a tougher sell.
“This action by the board has made negotiations of the rider even more difficult,” said Rumore. “Teachers are saying if this is the way they are going to act, why do we want to give anything up.”
The rider has been part of the contract for more than a decade — so long, in fact, that Rumore said he could not remember what the union bargained away in return for it.
The complicated past of the rider
The teachers’ union has not sat down to negotiate a new contract since 2004. Under a state law called the Triborough Amendment, public employees can continue to work under their previous contract after it expires. That keeps benefits, pay increases and the perk of nips-and-tucks protected.
But the rider comes with a cost.
According to a 2012 article in The Atlantic, 100 teachers who were laid off could have been kept on the job if the union would have agreed to suspend the cosmetic surgery rider for one year.
Rumore maintains the outgoing school board majority is attempting to leave a “legacy of contempt for teachers.”
Others argue that any contempt being shown is by the teachers for the kids they are supposed to be educating.
“The skin peel treatments, breast enhancements, eyelid work, tummy tucks, while we have 32,000 kids in poverty who need smaller classrooms, who need tremendous resources. To me it’s a moral issue,” Buffalo School Board Member Larry Quinn, said in a June 8 wgrz.com article.
Other than Nevergold, no Buffalo school board members returned Watchdog.org requests for comment.
Despite the legal setback, she remains confident that the cosmetic surgery rider will not live on indefinitely.
“I will not support this rider in a future contract and I do see this rider being removed,” Nevergold said.
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