School Board debate ratifying contract with teachers at Monday meeting

I first started at the Bemidji (Minn.) Pioneer as an intern in the summer of 1996. That would begin six years as a news reporter, sports reporter and copy editor for a small, six-day-per-week daily newspaper in northern Minnesota. I wrote a large range of stories from multiple beats, to features to sports, my favorite being the coverage of the Red Lake Reservation High School basketball team named the Warriors. Here is a collection of my stories from my time at the Pioneer.

Oct. 17, 1999

By Devlyn Brooks

The Bemidji School Board will decide whether to adopt a contract that was recently ratified by the district's teachers at its regular meeting 7 p.m. Monday at the Bemidji High School Green Room.

The district's 440-plus teachers ratified the two-year contract Monday and it includes a 5.59 percent raise in salaries and benefits the first year and a 4.8 percent raise the second year. The total will be about a 10.4 percent raise over the two years.

According to Superintendent Rollie Morud, the board will also officially hire Greg Liedl as the district's new transportation director.

Liedl is from Alexandria and will replace Randy Dukek, who left the district in September.

Other major discussions will include how to proceed with deciding if the new Bemidji High School will have an open or closed-campus policy; discussing the process of how to decide if the school district will become the sponsor of a new charter school in Bemidji; and hearing a report on capital projects in the district.

Finally, the board will hear a presentation on the Bemidji Middle School's School Nature Area Program; consider an agreement with Bemidji State University concerning student teachers; and discuss a grant program that would pay for planting trees at the new Lincoln Elementary School and high school.