Kansas House, Senate approve teacher bargaining bills

Both chambers of the Kansas Legislature advanced changes Thursday in the rules for collective bargaining between school boards and teachers unions.

The House and Senate approved separate bills that reflect a compromise that school administrators, boards, superintendents, and teachers’ unions reached in January. The House voted 109-14 to pass its bill on to the Senate, while the Senate gave first-round approval to its version.

State law currently compels the two sides to bargain on 31 issues each negotiations cycle, in addition to pay and hours, which critics have said leads to deadlocks and distractions in talks. The House bill would instead instruct each side to select five mandatory topics of discussion in addition to pay and hours. The Senate bill would allow the sides to select three mandatory additional topics.

Dodie Wellshear, a lobbyist for the United School Administrators of Kansas, said the education groups had been “shocked” that legislative committees had earlier refused to advance legislation reflecting the compromise but instead endorsed several conservative measures that restricted collective bargaining more drastically.

In the end, the compromise language entered the House and Senate bills as amendments.

Mark Desetti, a lobbyist for Kansas National Education Association, the state’s largest teachers union, said the victory of the compromise showed the system works.

“I think process worked as it’s supposed to work. We got hurt, we got frustrated, we talked to people, people listened to us and I think right decision was made by the House today, and I think a good decision was made by the Senate tonight,” Desetti said.

This story was originally published February 26, 2015 at 9:11 PM with the headline "Kansas House, Senate approve teacher bargaining bills."