Mar 25, 2011 By Carla Destefano 2 min read

Uniontown Area School Board directors voted in a special meeting Thursday to approve a two-year contract with Verizon for local and long distance services for the district. The board also unanimously approved to purchase the telephone and data network system through Sage Technology Solutions totaling $129,442. This is a savings of approximately $9,000 and all items are to be purchased through Pennsylvania Education Purchasing Program for Micro-Computers.

Dr. Charles Machesky, district superintendent, said the vote is to essentially pay the bill for the system. Funding for the system was included in the original design specifications of the construction project.

The board had tabled the motions at Monday’s regular March meeting after some directors had expressed concern about voting on items that had not been discussed. The items needed to have approval by March 24 in order to benefit from a discounted rate.

In other business, former school board director Susan Clay, also a candidate for Uniontown school director in the upcoming primary election, asked for clarification to a motion approved at Monday’s regular meeting regarding a retirement incentive for teachers. Clay questioned Machesky whether teachers who had reached maximum salary, achieved when district educators hit the 17th year mark of teaching, in addition to those with 30 years of teaching experience would be eligible for the incentive, which includes a $10,000 one-time payment.

“If someone at maximum salary chooses to submit a letter of interest, they may,” Machesky said. “We will gather the letters of interest, and we will see what interest we have and that will be discussed with the board at the April meeting.”

Eligible teachers can submit letters of interest until April 1.