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Board approves pay raises for teachers, staff By Peter Hancock phancock@ljworld.com
With little fanfare and almost no discussion, the Lawrence school board on Monday approved a new contract that will give teachers and other certified per-
sonnel an average 3-percent pay raise next year. The board also approved similar enhancements for administrators and classified staff including secretaries, janitors, cafeteria workers and other non-licensed employees.
Combined, those changes are expected to add $2.8 million to the district’s personnel costs next year, most of which is expected to come from spending down the district’s cash balances. “All of the wages and benefits for all the employee
groups before you tonight, going to that $2.8 million, does dip into the reserve funds and goes beyond the new state funding that we are getting from the state next year,” assistant superintendent Kyle Hayden told the board.
‘The benefit of all these vibrant spaces’
Under the contract with the Lawrence Education Association, the average total pay increase will be $1,381 per year. That includes a permanent $800 increase in base pay, plus funding for movement on Please see RAISES, page 2A
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Economic well-being of Kansas kids deteriorating, report says By Scott Rothschild srothschild@ljworld.com
TOPEKA — The economic well-being of children in Kansas is getting worse, according to data released Monday. The percentage of children living in poverty, children whose parents lack secure employment, and teens who are not in school and aren’t working have all increased from 2005 to 2011, according to the 2013 KIDS COUNT Data Book, released by the Annie E. Casey Foundation. Kansas ranked 16th among states in overall child well-being in categories covering health, economics, education and famThe data tell ily and community. That is the same us that Kansas rank Kansas had is moving in the last year, but Shannon Cotsoradis, wrong direction, president and chief despite the govexecutive officer ernor’s stated of Kansas Action commitment to for Children, said drilling down into reducing childthe statistics shows hood poverty in some disturbing his ‘Roadmap for trends, especially in the area of econom- Kansas.’” ic security. From 2005 to — Shannon Cotsoradis, 2011, the number president and chief of children living executive officer of Kansas in poverty has in- Action for Children creased from 15 percent to 19 percent. And the number of children living in areas of concentrated poverty has increased from 2 percent to 7 percent, which is a significantly higher increase than the national rate. “It’s a pretty bleak picture. One in five Kansas kids is living in poverty,” Cotsoradis said. They will less likely have adequate nutrition, access to health care and a high quality of early childhood learning, she said.
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Mike Yoder/Journal-World Photo
BRIAN WOLFE RAKES MULCH Saturday at the Lawrence Community Orchard during a volunteer work day at the garden. The orchard, at 830 Garfield St. in East Lawrence, is one of the community gardens in the city’s Common Ground program, which promotes turning vacant city lots into useful garden space.
Residents find ‘common ground’ in community garden program In return for the lots, each garden has to offer something back to the community, whether Skyler Adamson can that’s giving food to a local pantry, teaching picture it now: community children how to garden or allowing anyone to members walking between pick their own fruit and vegetables. By Giles Bruce
gbruce@ljworld.com
rows of brightly colored trees, reading the informational signs planted in front of each one, picking fresh fruit off the branches. While his vision is still a few years from being realized, thanks to Lawrence’s Common Ground initiative
it’s at least a possibility. Adamson coordinates the Lawrence Community Orchard, one of several community gardens that make up the program, which
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turns vacant eye sores of city lots into lush fruit-andvegetable-producing green spaces. The undertaking has so far garnered a lot of interest (and creativity)
from the community, expanding to seven sites in its second year. Organizers say Common Ground not only saves the city time and money from having to mow the unused lots, but gives residents places to learn about gardening and farming while growing fresh, healthy produce — nearly in their own backyards. The idea was hatched
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A Republican outcast These days, Insurance Commissioner Sandy Praeger is a GOP misfit out of step with her lifelong party and shunned by the Republican establishment. Page 3A
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Vol.155/No.176 20 pages