NEW YORK STATE Higher pay cap for BOCES chiefs awaits action

The leaders of 37 BOCES district across New York state are waiting for word about whether state legislation allowing higher maximum pay for BOCES superintendents will be sent to the governor for approval or get lost in the Albany abyss.

The legislation was approved 130-0 by the state Assembly on May 31 and 61-0 by the state Senate on June 7, but it has not been delivered to Gov. Andrew Cuomo, according to Ulster BOCES Superintendent Charles Khoury.

Khoury, speaking at an Onteora school board meeting this week, said the salaries might become part of future studies about executive-level pay for public officials in the state.

“There is a commission that is looking at the salary cap that applied to legislators that’s been in effect since 1998,” he said. “That commission has been charged with looking at a legislative salary cap as well as executive branch salary cap. They’re supposed to issue a report on Dec. 10.”

Khoury said state lawmakers apparently are waiting for the report before asking Cuomo to sign the BOCES salary legislation.

If the bill does go to Cuomo, it would have to be signed before the end of the month to be in effect for 2019. If he vetoes the bill, it will be dead for the time being because the state Legislature has no plans to reconvene this year and therefore could not vote to override the veto.

The current salary cap for BOCES superintendents in New York is $166,752 per year. It was designed to keep BOCES superintendents from earning more than the $170,155 paid to the state education commissioner 15 years ago.

The new cap passed by the Legislature would be 98 percent of the state education commissioner’s 2018-19 salary, which is $250,000. And annual increases could not exceed 6 percent of a BOCES superintendent’s current salary.

Dutchess County BOCES Superintendent Richard Hooley said by phone this week that the new salary cap being approved unanimously by state lawmakers was a recognition of how important BOCES services are for individual school districts.

“We can assist and support school districts in a way that the state Education Department couldn’t, but if I retire, it is going to be hard to find someone who [will] ... work for that salary when they can stay in a school district and do better than the salary of the [BOCES] superintendent,” Hooley said.

In Ulster County, school district superintendent salaries range from $170,000 in Onteora to $204,000 in Kingston.