Teacher salaries issue sharpens across region

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports on the special class of workers:

When Neshaminy High School biology teacher Louise Boyd looks at her paycheck – with yearly pay of $97,652 and fully provided health insurance - she sees the fruits of a long campaign to pay educators what they believe they're worth.

"We had to fight, claw, scratch, and beg," said Boyd, president of the Neshaminy Federation of Teachers, "and now we do make a professional salary."

But when Levittown parent Susan Porreca looks at Neshaminy teachers' pay and perks, she sees red. A 47-year-old office manager who was unemployed or underemployed for most of 2009 while her welder husband spent three months out of work, Porreca has joined a local taxpayers' group because she's furious at the union's tough tactics in fighting to keep those gains.

"I've taken a lot of time, read their collective-bargaining agreement - none of it has to do with the education of our kids," said Porreca, whose daughter is a sophomore at Neshaminy High. "It's a gimme, gimme, gimme - all the things they have and things they want to keep. And they don't want to contribute to health care when they're making six-figure salaries. That is unbelievable to me."

You'll want to read this one about class war.