School Board of the City of Virginia Beach
Policy 4-34

PERSONNEL

Gainsharing Plan

A.  Generally

The purpose of this gainsharing plan is to support the school division's goals and objectives by reducing operating costs through increased productivity, improving the quality of services rendered by the school system, and recognizing the involvement of employees in operational improvements. Through this plan, employees may participate in the savings (i.e., gains) realized by the school system from organizational improvements.

Savings in tax dollars appropriated by city council may be (1) distributed to school division employees through a gainsharing pool, (2) used to pay priority expenditures of a non-recurring nature such as capital outlays, and/or (3) allocated to the revenue reserve fund to cover future revenue shortfalls.

B.  Conditions for Gainsharing Funding

The following conditions must be present in the school division each year before gainsharing funding may be considered by the school board:

1.  The school division's total actual operating fund revenues for the fiscal year just ended must exceed actual School Operating Fund expenditures;

2.  The school division's total School Operating Fund expenditures for the fiscal year just ended must be less than the total operating fund appropriations; and

3.  School division department heads must certify that savings are not the result of deferred maintenance, deferred strategic plan initiatives, deferred replacement of essential equipment or supplies, moderate weather and any windfall from other revenues from revenue sharing sources under the City revenue sharing plan.

C.  Determination of Gainsharing Funds

1.  After school division accounts for the fiscal year just ended have been closed, the associate superintendent of Budget, Finance and Technology shall prepare for the superintendent a report on the amount of savings realized during the fiscal year through quality initiatives, productivity improvements, and cost avoidance. The report shall include recommendations for distribution of the savings, including the amount of individual employee gainsharing checks that may, upon approval of the school board and city council, be paid from a gainsharing pool.

2.  The superintendent shall recommend to the school board the percentage of the savings (1) to be used to pay priority expenditures of a non-recurring nature such as capital outlays, (2) to be allocated to a reserve fund to cover potential future revenue shortfalls, and/or (3) to be distributed to a gainsharing pool for employees. In addition, if, in his discretion, the superintendent recommends that a percentage of the savings be distributed to a gainsharing pool, he shall also recommend the specific dollar amount of individual gainsharing checks.

3.  In the event the school board, in its discretion, approves a recommendation by the superintendent that gainsharing checks be provided to employees, and approves the superintendent's recommended gainsharing formula, the board shall, in October or November following the fiscal year in which the savings occurred, request city council to appropriate a portion of the Board's year-end surplus to be distributed to employees in the form of gainsharing checks.

D.  Employee Eligibility

The following criteria must be present for an employee to be eligible to receive a gainsharing check from the funds, if any, appropriated to a gainsharing pool:

1.  All employees classified as full-time employees will be eligible for gainsharing checks from a gainsharing pool except those employees whose performance for that fiscal year has been identified as unsatisfactory.

Any employee whose performance indicates that the basic requirements of his or her position are not being met (a marginal employee) shall be ineligible to receive a gainsharing check.

2.  The employee must have been on the school division's payroll as an active employee prior to October 1 through the end of their respective contract year continuously during the fiscal year in which the savings occurred.

3.  Members of the school board, the superintendent and cabinet members are not eligible to receive gainsharing checks.

E.  Distribution of Gainsharing Funds

1.  If funds are appropriated by city council for an employee gainsharing pool, such funds shall be paid to eligible employees out of a designated gainsharing fund or account. Savings percentages appropriated for capital outlays, other non-recurring priorities, or the reserve fund shall not be handled through the gainsharing pool account. Expenditures for these purposes shall be made from other accounts.

2.  The assistant superintendent for Human Resources shall prepare and submit to the superintendent and the associate superintendent of Budget, Finance and Technology a list of employees who are eligible to receive gainsharing checks for the fiscal year just closed.

3.  If the distribution of gainsharing checks is recommended by the superintendent and approved by the school board, and city council appropriates funds for the gainsharing plan, the associate superintendent for Budget, Finance and Technology shall oversee the preparation and distribution of individual gainsharing checks as follows:

a.  Gainsharing checks paid to eligible employees will be based on the amount approved by the school board and the funds appropriated by city council.

b.  Gainsharing checks will be distributed in one lump sum payment on or before the first regular paycheck in December.

c.  Gainsharing checks will be separately drawn for each eligible employee and will be of equal amounts before deductions.

d.  Social security taxes will be deducted from the gross gainsharing check.

e.  Federal and state taxes will not be withheld; however, the gross check amount will be included in the employee's Federal Form W-2 and the Virginia Form VA-2 with other amounts earned during the year.

f.  Gainsharing payments are not subject to Virginia Retirement System or Virginia Retirement System Life Insurance benefits.

g.  Gainsharing checks remaining unclaimed or uncashed on June 30th of the fiscal year in which they were distributed will revert to the appropriate fund of the school system.

 

Adopted by School Board: June 17, 1997