MIDDLETOWN - Negotiating teams for the Middletown Board of Education and the Middletown Teachers Association will meet with a fact-finder from the American Arbitration Association Feb. 11.

        Both sides declared an impasse in contract talks Oct. 31 after several months of unsuccessful negotiations on a new master contract for teachers.

        “We've been able to reach agreement on everything but two things — wages and health care,” said Edmund Pokora, treasurer of the Middletown Schools and a member of the board's negotiating team. “We're disappointed we don't have a contract yet.”

        Between now and the hearing, teachers will continue to wear white buttons with purple letters that read Support Our Teachers, Settle Now, said Carolyn David son, a sixth-grade teacher at Roosevelt Elementary School and MTA president. No job action is planned.

        “Money is our No. 1 issue,” Ms. Davidson said. “We'd like to be able to complete negotiations. We're anxious to see it come to completion.”

        Middletown's 559 teachers have been working under conditions of the former master contract which expired June 30, Ms. Davidson said. Teachers have not received any increases on the base salary this year.

        Negotiations with the board began last spring, were stopped over the summer and resumed when classes started after spring break, Ms. Davidson said. There have been no formal talks with the full negotiating teams since impasse was declared but there have been a few informal talks, the last earlier this month.

        This is the first contract the MTA has negotiated since the Monroe Schools began operating independently of Middletown in July 2000.

        Neither side is obligated to accept the ruling of the fact-finder, who is obligated to issue a report within 30 days of the hearing.

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