More than a year of payroll problems at Windham Northeast Supervisory Union came to a head at a school board meeting Wednesday, when 50 teachers and staff members aired a host of grievances and questions that remain unanswered.
Attendees at Bellows Falls Middle School said the problems started almost two years ago, but only got worse after local officials volunteered to be an early adopter of the software that all districts will be forced to use by 2024 under state statute.
“For the last several months, the complete fiasco that has been the new finance system has affected every single function of this district,” said school board member Jack Bryar. “There is an avalanche of problems.”
Jessica Aukema, who is part of the grievance committee for the teachers union, shared survey results from employees, which found salaries were incorrect in some cases, sick and personal time were inaccurate, deductions had been taken out of paychecks twice or not at all, and after-school hours hadn’t been paid.
“Nothing about this has been communicated from the business office,” she said.
Laura Taylor, a substitute teacher, said three of her four paychecks have been wrong since November.
In one pay period, she received an incorrect check for $35 for nine days of subbing. The next pay period, she was overpaid by $667. She also received a pay stub for substituting at Saxton’s River Elementary School, even though she hadn’t worked there in five years.
“How am I to feel confident that my W-2 is going to be correct because I have nothing to show for it?” she said.
Many teachers and staff members were concerned about taxes and interest, explaining money that was supposed to be deducted from their paychecks and placed into retirement accounts weren’t deposited in the correct year.
Brenda Forrest, who’s been a special educator for 35 years, said she just received an $1,800 deposit into her TD Ameritrade account, which should have been deposited in 2019. She said she’s lost out on interest from stock market gains.
“That’s a huge amount of interest,” said Forrest, who said she’s close to retirement. “For me it will affect me so much more than someone just starting out.”
Sean Murphy, a math teacher who’s been at Bellows Falls Union High School for 11 years, said his paychecks haven’t reflected his $1,500 raise since the beginning of the school year. Murphy estimated the district owes him $600.
“People want to get paid and want to get paid correctly,” Murphy said after the meeting. There were also health care concerns.
Susan Swan, a math teacher, said she was recently informed some of her health care claims from fall doctor appointments have been denied.
“There’s definitely a problem there,” Swan said during the meeting. “There were five of us who had the same problem in the past day or so.”
Several people said nobody from the business office informed them there were issues.
Business office employees said problems started when the school district made a switch to a new state-mandated software system, eFinancePlus, in January 2019. All school districts are required to adopt the new financial software by 2023 as part of statewide consolidation efforts. Windham Northeast was one of the first in the state to use the software.
Bryar, the board member, said the business office received no training other than online videos for the software.
“We made a really big mistake being early adopters,” he said. “There’s no question about that.”
Officials at the Agency of Education did not respond to requests for comment Thursday.
Superintendent Chris Pratt, who started his position in July 2018, said he’s received 13 grievances from employees over pay issues, of which five have been resolved.
“I wish I could do more,” Pratt said after the meeting.
Pratt said the state offered the new software free for early adopters. The district’s previous software system, which had been in place for 11 years, cost $22,000 annually.
However, Pratt said learning the state’s system has cost about $66,000 in overtime so far. He said many staff members have worked at the office until 10 p.m., including weekends and holidays.
Pratt, who previously worked in Windham Southwest Supervisory Union, said the decision to switch to the new software was made before he arrived.
“This was just the perfect storm,” Pratt said. “The system put us behind the eight ball.”
Despite the software challenges, several people in the auditorium said problems didn’t escalate until November, when payroll clerk Ronda Williams was let go.
“It doesn’t make sense that a payroll person wasn’t in place before Ronda was let go,” administrative assistant Melanie LaRoss said.
At one point during the meeting, several people turned toward Williams in the back of the auditorium and gave her a standing ovation, praising her for her effort.
Pratt told audience members he let Williams go for “a number of reasons I’m not going to discuss.”
“I have to take responsibility for what came out of that,” he added.
Pratt said after the meeting that the district was struggling before Williams departed. One of the district’s accountants also left last May, he said.
The district currently employs about 450 people. Pratt said employees keep track of hours with paper time slips and some of them have been lost since Williams’ departure.
“The time sheets can go through four people before making it to the main office,” Pratt said. “The more hands they pass through, the more likely something’s going to be lost.”
He said the district will use automated timesheets next year to eliminate redundancies and inaccuracies.
Williams said after the meeting that she was told she was fired because payroll wasn’t getting done on time. She declined to give more detail.
“I loved my job,” said Williams, who had been there for 12 years.
Williams said the new software system was challenging, but the old software system also “had its quirks.”
The issues within the district surprised several board members.
“I feel blindsided by this tonight,” board member Jessa Westclark said.
Some people asked the board to have a third-party auditor review the district’s finances.
The board also wrote down questions that couldn’t be answered during Wednesday’s meeting and promised a written response. Among them were how W-2s and taxes would be impacted and how employees would be paid for lost interest on investment accounts. There was also confusion as to when the superintendent’s office became aware of the issues.
Business Manager Edie Cole said she’s been working seven days a week to right the ship.
“I haven’t gotten a lot of sleep,” she said. “It’s been a rough year and a half.”
Despite the mounting concerns, Cole said most of the issues had been resolved.
“I think we’ve got everything taken care of,” Cole said. “I know this has been tough on all of you. It wasn’t for lack of trying.”
