South Portland teachers are upset over a vote by the school board on Thursday to give Assistant Superintendent Johanna Prince an additional $12,000 even as the school district faces the elimination of 80 staff positions, according to Sarah Gay, the president of the teacher’s union.

The $12,000 is not a salary increase or a bonus, said School Board Chair Rosemarie De Angelis. She said the one-time payment will be added to the assistant superintendent’s annuity account throughout the next year in recognition for extra responsibilities she took on during this year’s difficult budget season, including hosting 14 listening sessions at the elementary schools. 

“The board is grateful and appreciative for all of the pieces she has picked up,” De Angelis said. 

Gay said that her email inbox has been flooded with complaints from teachers about the decision.

Going above and beyond is the expectation for educators, she said, with many putting in extra hours, purchasing supplies with their own money and sometimes taking on the role of advocate or caretaker. 

“Public education is pretty famously not an industry where hard work is rewarded by bonuses,” Gay said. “Many people have extended themselves beyond what seems to be a reasonable human capacity this year, and picking an individual to effectively be rewarded was probably not a great choice.”

Teachers questioned the timing of the decision during a painful budget year. 

The board earlier this year voted to close James O. Kaler Elementary School and cut nearly 80 positions to shave about $8.4 million from its current operations to hold the tax increase in its proposed budget to 6%. 

There were reductions to student-facing positions and supports like summer credit recovery, learning software and composting at the high school’s garden.

The decision was made after the official budget process. The City Council voted in early May to put the $76.2 million budget before voters on Tuesday. 

“If the board felt strongly that this individual’s salary needed to be higher, that should have gone through the budget process,” Gay said. 

When asked for the assistant superintendent’s base salary, De Angelis said that she did not have the exact figure in front of her. The salary is spread out across different line items in the budget, including benefits and stipends.

Central office salaries are not posted or readily available online, Gay said. During budget season, information about individual salaries needed to be requested directly, and it was not easily obtained, she said.

Prince did not immediately respond to questions about her salary.

The school board has not yet determined exactly where the money will come from to fund the payment, according to De Angelis. 

“Was there $12,000 worth of something else that we could or should have had instead?” Gay asked. De Angelis said $12,000 would not have been enough to restore a position. 

Gay worries that the optics of the decision may impact Tuesday’s vote on the school budget. The teachers’ union wants voters to support the budget, she said.

“If our budget fails, we will have to cut more positions,” she said. “We need to move forward with what we have.”