NIAGARA FALLS — With a large number of Niagara Falls School District employees earning top salaries, district union leaders defend the earnings saying they are low in comparison with countywide school district numbers.

The school district has 132 employees earning between $80,000 and $90,000. Thirty-seven are making more than $90,000, including 22 people making more than $100,000.

Despite those numbers, Teacher’s Union President Joseph Catalano said teachers are paid appropriately for their qualifications.

“We are either the seventh, eighth or ninth highest-paid district of nine school districts in Niagara County depending on what step the teacher is on,” Catalano said.

He said the starting salary for teachers is $39,950 and increases approximately 1.8 percent a year over 17 years on what the district calls a “step system.”

Catalano said the top step is $84,155 and that number is equivalent to 17 years experience, 90 graduate hours and one master’s degree.

“In comparison to other districts, our top step is in the middle of the pack,” he said.

School District Superintendent Cynthia Bianco said it is important to compensate teachers for furthering their education, because the work is directly reflected in the classroom.

“We want teachers to continue their education, it’s a continual learning process,” Bianco said. “We have to be able to adjust to the changes so we encourage this and we negotiate this recognition through the step system,” Bianco said.

Additional education can add up for teachers, as they are compensated $3,500 for each master’s degree, up to two, and even more if they possess a doctorate.

While $84,155 may be the highest salary step for teachers, they are gaining additional appropriations by opting out of the district’s insurance, coaching athletic teams to working lunch duties among others.

“Are our salaries high? Well high is relative,” Bianco said. “We think we have good salaries, but very much comparable and as Joe stated in the lower half of the county.”

Catalano added 196 teachers are making between $50,000 and $60,000.

“That’s a big number, we’re not all making $80,000 or $90,000,” Catalano said.

Adminstrator’s Union Representative Larry Martinez echoed Catalano, saying the district’s administrators are in the middle of the pack in terms of Niagara County salary schedules.

He said almost all administrators in the Niagara Falls School District work 12 months and are compensated appropriately through their salaries.

“We feel you get paid for the position. If your a principal, you get paid as a principal If you are vice principal, you get paid appropriately.”

Martinez said administrators’ salaries are based on a formula and not an arbitrary number.

“We took step 17 because that is what most administrators would be making if they were in the classroom and we add one master’s degree to that and prorate it 20 percent,” Martinez said. “We also add 4.8 percent, which is a premium for our responsibility, since we cannot be compensated for lunch or morning duties like teachers can be.”

Martinez said over the years a number of the districtwide cuts have come at the administration level. He said administrator positions have been cut from 60 to 20 over the years to adapt to changing demographics in Niagara Falls.

Bianco explained the district’s reasoning.

“It’s really responding to the changing dynamics not only of the school district but of our community,” Bianco said. “Just as we have made an effort to consolidate schools, and school buildings over the past five years, we have organized and restructured staff, we have to meet the times in which we’re in and we have to be really fluid about that.”

Catalano said the teachers’ union has more than 40 percent of employees on a holding step, meaning they will not be given a raise and hinted the union may be seeking a raise during upcoming contract negotiations.

Contact reporter Nick Mattera at 282-2311, ext. 2251.