BUTLER TWP — Twenty-two teachers at the Butler Vocational-Technical School still are without a contract after teacher union members on Monday rejected a tentative agreement.

Tom Breth, solicitor for the vo-tech, said Wednesday, “We spent over a year and a half getting a tentative agreement with them, and then their membership voted it down. It’s very disheartening.”

Teachers have been without a current contract there since July 2014.

The school’s joint operating committee had approved the agreement.

The offer laid out to the teachers on Monday was a four-year agreement that would have a retroactive start date last year.

The first year of the agreement was status quo, with no changes to raises or health care. Teachers starting this year would receive a $2,000 raise annually for the next three years.

A new health care package, set to start Nov. 1, would be a higher deductible plan with the school covering most of the costs. The deductible is $1,300 per individual and $2,600 per family.

The school would cover all costs this year and everything but $690 for the third and fourth years of the contract.

“We’re hoping to resume negotiations soon and reach a settlement,” said Kurt Speicher, director of the vo-tech School.

Terrie Holter, a vo-tech teachers’ union representative with the Pennsylvania State Education Association, could not be reached for comment Wednesday.