Elmbrook Considers Reducing Sick Leave, Long-term Disability Benefits

A consultant is recommending the Elmbrook School District reduce its sick leave and long-term disability benefits for staff for an annual savings of about $76,500.

District teachers and staff earn a varying number of sick days annually, depending on their job title and tenure. But new sick days would be capped at seven per year, under a recommendation by Willis Human Capital Practice.

Long-term disability benefits should be reduced to cover 70 percent of a disabled employee's income, down from the current 90 percent income replacement, John Dawson, Willis senior vice president and actuary, recommended at the School Board's Personnel Committee meeting Tuesday.

The disability benefits change would save about $60,500 a year. The reduced sick days would save about $16,000 in substitute teacher costs, Dawson estimated.

Like all public school districts in Wisconsin, Elmbrook is working to create an employee handbook to cover details on benefits, policies and working conditions formerly covered in a union contract bargained between teachers and administrators.

Elmbrook administrators also are looking for cost savings, while working to make sure the district remains a competitive, attractive employer for top-notch teachers.

Already, Elmbrook is seeing the pressure of districts trying to poach teachers by offering higher pay, Superintendent Matt Gibson and Human Resources Director and Staff Counsel Kristi Foy told the committee.

Some have left to earn more money elsewhere, they said.

Dawson said private sector employers more often offer a 60 percent income replacement benefit for long-term disability, a level that would save Elmbrook about $85,000 a year. But he recommended a 70 percent disability benefit to keep Elmbrook competitive among public school districts.

Long-term disability is available to employees who typically can not return to work due to a major illness such as cancer or other disability. Maternity leaves are not considered long-term disabilities, Foy said.

On the sick leave issue, Dawson presented information showing that Elmbrook's 962 employees had 39,456 sick days banked at the beginning of the year. (Employees are allowed to bank up to 90 sick days.)

Employees accrued 9,767 additional sick days this year, increasing the total banked to 49,223. Of that 49,223, employees used 6,700 sick days this year.

Under Willis' recommendation to cap future sick day accruals to seven a year, employees would have accrued 5,682 more sick days this year, or about 4,000 fewer than they did. Employees likely would have taken 6,447 sick days or about 250 fewer than they did.

Had they accrued a maximum seven days a year, 68 employees would not have been able to take as many sick days as they did last year, Dawson said.

The point behind reforming the sick day benefit is to reduce substitute teacher costs, he said. Not only does it cost the district about $100 a day for a substitute, it also causes disruptions for student learning, he said.

Some teachers don't use any of their sick days, while others use all of them every year, Foy said. 

Patrick Coffey, president of the teachers union, the Elmbrook Education Association and a social studies teacher at Brookfield East High School, said he never uses his sick days.

Coffey praised Foy for her work in bridging teachers into the post-collective bargaining world. He agreed with her that the more information teachers can receive — and input they can provide — about future benefits and working conditions decisions, the better the district will be.

Foy said she will provide employees with a mountain of information about new health plan designs and health insurance information before they have to make annual decisions in October's health open enrollment period.

The Personnel Committee also is studying whether to make changes to retirement benefits. A new grievance procedure also must be in place by October, under the state changes to collective bargaining.

Committee member Meg Wartman asked Foy if there was any talk about ending the district's early release of students every Thursday.

"It's a struggle for our families," Wartman said. "I don't know if it's the best thing for our kids."

But Foy and Coffey said the early release of students was needed, especially next year, to give staff time to meet in teams and work on professional development as the high schools move to a block schedule with fewer, longer classes.