The Legislative Council unanimously approved a four-year teacher contract during a regular meeting January 20 that will have a total impact of just under $4 million through the 2019 fiscal year. At the same time, the council. in an 11-1 vote, moved to amend Newtown's debt policy to reduce capital borrowing limits from 10 to 9.8 percent of the town's annual overall budget.

During a presentation to the council, Superintendent of Schools Joseph V. Erardi, Jr acknowledged that both parties engaged in the contract negotiations walked away from the final decision unhappy, which he said is a sign that the settlement was ultimately a fair one for both the town and teachers.

At one point during discussion, Councilman Chris Eide, who is an educator in Danbury, mentioned that based on the settlement, if he ended up taking a position in Newtown it would come with a reduction in pay compared to what he is making currently.

"Taxpayers are getting a bargain," Mr Eide told his council colleagues.

The contract passed the Board of Education unanimously, and according to Dr Erardi, was filed with the town and state Department of Education November 4.

Each year of the contract provides step salary increases, with some limitations. The increases depend on degrees and length of service.

The increases in 2016-17 range from 3.28 percent to 5.66 percent; in 2017-18 increases range from 3.28 percent to 5.74 percent; in 2018-19 increases range from 3.28 percent to 5.75 percent; and in 2019-2020 increases range from 3.28 percent to 5.75 percent, according to the district's business office.

For the 2015-16 school year a new teacher starting in the district with a bachelor of arts degree would make $46,343, and a teacher with more than 15 years of experience and a doctorate degree would make $95,949. In the 2019-20 year the same positions would make $47,511 and $98,764, respectively.

Following a request by Councilman George Ferguson, Dr Erardi produced figures detailing the breakdown annual cost to taxpayers. The contract will increase the district's budget by about $923,000 in 2016; $1 million in 2017; $963,000 in 2018; and $1.1 million in 2019, providing a total increase of just under 4.3 percent overall.

However, Dr Erardi made a point of reminding the council that the financial implications of those increases would be reduced if a continued drop in student population dictates cuts in district teaching staff.

During discussion, it was determined that the new contract falls "somewhere in the middle" of contracts negotiated in both neighboring communities and other districts similar in size and demographics to Newtown, according to Council Chair Mary Ann Jacob.

"These are the districts where our teachers would be most likely to seek jobs," Ms Jacob told The Bee following the meeting. "We acknowledge that it is a lot of money, but it's important to reinforce that those numbers assume the same level of staffing into the 2020 school year."

Councilman Anthony Filiato asked whether the new contract increased the amount of instruction time required of teachers. Dr Erardi replied that the current contract neither increased nor decreased instructional time. The superintendent responded to a question from Councilman Dan Wiedemann about benefits, saying Newtown teachers are now on the "extreme top end" regarding their own contributions to their medical benefits.

Dr Erardi also noted that the contract increased the total amount budgeted for stipends from $15,000 to $40,000, and that the district negotiated to eliminate longevity benefits for any educators hired after July 1 of this year.

Mr Ferguson commented that the contract appeared to be the result of a "good negotiation," adding that the results reflected an "honest effort to come to terms."

Councilman Dan Honan made the motion to accept the contract, and it was passed unanimously with no further discussion.

As school officials and supporters filed out of the council chambers, Dr Erardi said that the involvement of council liaisons Ryan Knapp and Neil Chaudhary played critical roles on behalf of the town, in helping to reach the final contract agreement.

"In my experience, those appointees are largely ceremonial and they don't typically bring much to the negotiating sessions when they bother to show up at all," the superintendent said. "But in the case of Neil and Ryan, they were all in - coming to nearly every session with spreadsheets and a willingness to be part of the process. These two brought extraordinary contributions, while viewing the end results of this contract through the lens of council members."

Later in the evening, Ms Jacob said the council acted to reduce the official debt cap on capital borrowing from the current 10 percent to 9.8 percent, promising further review by the council's finance committee, which is chaired by Mr Ferguson.

"We're looking for a comprehensive review of the debt policy," Ms Jacob said. She said one of the concerns is that the Board of Finance recently removed "debt per capita"  language from the policy because that number is hard to quantify.

"We likely won't have much further discussion of this as a board until the next CIP process," she said. "But we will continue to work finding ways to reduce spending."

Ms Jacob suggested a more frequent review, and possibly a more frequent, nominal reduction in borrowing may be a logical course to pursue since the budget tends to increase every year.

"So as that budget slowly increases, we will need to keep borrowing steady," she said. "That will require us to keep lowering the debt cap."

Council member Judit DeStefano was the sole vote against the debt cap reduction.