12.5% Proration in Alabama
Get ready for the screams, folks.
In related news, Madison just gave their superintendent a 9% raise – bumping his salary up to $149,000. Not too bad at all for an employee of a public institution facing a 12.5% budget cut. The raise was on top of a $1800 adjustment he received earlier to keep his salary 5% higher than any other salary in the system. That came in response to 7% raises* for employees in the district. So at least one other employee in the Madison School District makes a little over $130,000. I bet it isn’t a teacher.
Somewhat unsurprisingly, the Huntsville Times thought it was “money well spent” to give Fowler a big raise in the face of proration. Granted, the Times didn’t know just how deep the cuts were going to be, but they knew the cuts were coming. You might recall that Fowler was one of the lead cheerleaders for the failed half cent sales tax increase that the Times’ editorial board was thoroughly smitten with.
*You’re not alone if you think 7% seems excessive just before massive budget cuts. It REALLY seems excessive when you read that one of the responses to proration will be to lay off teachers. If the school board hadn’t been so dang generous in the first place maybe they could afford to keep a couple of extra teachers during the lean times.
