Moss shares ideas on teacher housing with Beaufort County school board
Superintendent Jeff Moss enlisted high school students to help pitch his plan to provide affordable housing to teachers at Tuesday's school board meeting.
The group from Bluffton High School, members of a civil engineering and architecture class, presented a research report on the county's high cost of living compared to other counties competing with the district teachers. They sought to solve the district's struggle in recruiting and retaining teachers despite a salary that's out of line with the area's high cost of living.
District-wide, 87.9 percent of the district's 1,500 teachers had returned from the 2013-2014 school year. That's just below an average of 91 percent of teachers in similar districts.
Their preliminary designs of one- to three-bedroom homes for teachers align with Moss' goal, which would include considerably lower monthly rates than the local rental market.
Moss says he has also been in talks with the Beaufort Housing Authority, the town of Bluffton and other potential stakeholders.
An affordable housing program would add to the district's efforts that also include a new cost-of-living supplement approved by the school board last year.
Employees are receiving the first half of their $1,000-a-year bonus on Friday, and will receive an additional $1,000 each year until the supplement totals $5,000.
"We're struggling to attract and retain the numbers of classroom teachers we need," Moss said. "And teachers who turn down jobs in our district -- or teachers who accept jobs here but move away after a year or two -- frequently cite housing expenses as a major factor in their decisions.
During their presentation, students in Justin Robinson's design class suggested placing houses or town homes for teachers next to Bluffton's Red Cedar Elementary School, near Oscar Frazier Park, and providing them with extra amenities like pool and fitness center memberships.
Board member Bill Payne, a former Beaufort County educator, said he would have loved access to the opportunities the students presented.
"This is something we can use, and we need it now," Payne said.
Several other board members congratulated the students on their work, and for going further to solve the district's retention woes than have past administrators and boards.
"I think we need to rally around you and see where this takes us," Laura Bush said.
Moss said the presentation was a testament to students' knack for applying lessons in class to real-world problems.
He did not provide a cost estimate for the project Tuesday but has maintained the money would not come from the district's budget, but from grants and other sources.
In the spring, an Island Packet and Beaufort Gazette analysis determined that the district was one of just four in the state -- along with Charleston, Florence 4 and Lexington 4 -- that has an average teacher salary below $50,000 when adjusted for cost of living.
In Beaufort County, the average teacher salary of about $50,000 goes only as far as $40,480.
Your view
Facebook fans of The Island Packet & Beaufort Gazette were quick to chime in on this topic when we first reported it in November. Here's a sample of that response.
Maybe we can just pay teachers a respectable salary from the get go. Why would you want to get a job where a 4-year degree is mandatory and live in county-provided housing?
Trevor McCants
Beaufort County actually has some of the highest paid teachers. What is missing is affordable real estate in Beaufort County. Then of course there is the work environment... BCSD spends a lot of money on recruitment of new teachers. Most new teachers leave after the first year or couple of years (assuming they even make it through the first year).
Elizabeth Elston
Affordable housing for everyone! There are many people who struggle to afford to live and work here.
Jennifer Petroff
What about affordable housing for everyone?
Kelly Patterson
Has anybody suggested just paying them a competitive wage? Seriously.
Gene Brancho
How about pay them enough to buy a reasonable house. Let them live where they would like to. I'm sure teachers would prefer to invest in a property that they would own. Your plan may get you young/new teachers but even that offer won't keep them.
Lara Alexander Williams
What about affordable housing for everyone. No exceptions.
Tracy Waters
At least some regions care about their teachers. Nice to know. All they do is poop on us down here in Florida. No raise in 8 years and rentals about $1,200 a month is killing. I might have to move back to Beaufort County!
Jody Chilton
They used to do this in Palm Beach County.
Karen Bellantoni Curley
They do this for teachers in London or at least they used to when I lived there 9 years ago.
Ashley Kemeny
Affordable housing is needed period. This is a tourism income based county. Most of the people that live here work for under $15 an hour. You cannot afford $1,200 a month on that kind of income. At the rate its going, if this isn't fixed most of low-income workers will end up leaving to find housing and eventually work closer to that new housing which means a crash for the economy here if there's no one to fill these low income jobs. That's why so many businesses go out of business here.
Leanne Howard
Follow reporter Rebecca Lurye on Twitter at twitter.com/IPBG_Rebecca.
Related content:
May 28, 2015 At the end of the 2014-15 school year, about 150 teachers would walk away from their jobs with the Beaufort County School District. That's about one in every 10 of the district's teaching force. | READ
- Affordable housing for Beaufort County teachers in the works, November 24, 2015
This story was originally published December 9, 2015 at 12:14 PM with the headline "Moss shares ideas on teacher housing with Beaufort County school board."