JEFFERSON TWP — The South Butler School District is considering teacher layoffs for the 2016-17 school year.

District solicitor Tom Breth said the district is looking at a number of personnel issues, including retirements that may not be replaced. The school board and administration have been discussing the issue of potential layoffs in executive session, Breth said.

Breth could not say how many teachers could be affected by the layoffs, and he does not believe the district offered incentives for early retirement.

The district has a March 1 deadline for teachers to submit their retirement intentions, but the school board can receive requests after that deadline and vote to approve or reject the requests.

Breth stressed the decision is not final.

“Nothing’s been decided,” he said.

When asked if the district has sent out layoff notices, Breth said teachers should not be receiving notices because the board has not made any decisions yet.

“I don’t know how anybody would be issuing notices when the board hasn’t made a decision,” he said. “Nothing has been issued by the board’s directive.”

The district and its 168 teachers are in the middle of contract negotiations after the previous six-year contract expired in June 2014.

The points of contention include wages and health care benefits, but a fact-finding report prepared by arbitrator Marc A. Winters was rejected by the teachers’ union in October 2015. The school board had approved that report, which called for a five-year contract from 2016-2021.

The basis of the union’s rejection was that the proposed change pushes the health care burden back on the employee, according to Brooke Witt, a Pennsylvania State Education Association representative with the teachers’ union.

“A lot of people would be going back financially based on the cost shifting,” she said. “It’s concessionary. It’s a cost-shifting plan. Much larger amounts of the health care cost are put back on employees.”

Superintendent David Zupsic was unable to be reached for comment.

Nelda Burd, president of the school board, could not confirm or deny that the district is looking into layoffs, but she did say the topic may be discussed at the next board meeting at 7 p.m. Wednesday at the library of Knoch Middle School, 754 Dinnerbell Road.