In a tense meeting marked by public jeers and catcalls, the Brevard School Board snubbed a significant teacher pay raise plan recommended by a state-appointed mediator, and instead backed by a 4-1 vote a smaller salary hike proposed by Superintendent Mark Mullins.

The board struggled to maintain order in the district office where a crowd of at least 900 teachers dressed in red, parents and students packed the room in support of the special magistrate's plan.

“This was a total disgrace that this school [board] chose to vote over the interests of the students as identified by the special magistrate and went with the district’s flawed numbers,” Brevard Federation of Teachers president Anthony Colucci said after the vote.

Mullins’ proposal includes raises of $1,100 and $825 for "highly effective" and "effective" teachers respectively, with a $650 one-time bonus, plus a $500 bonuses for all first-year returning teachers. The union had wanted recurring raises of $2,300 and $1,724 respectively – an approach endorsed by the magistrate last month, following nearly six months of impasse.

“We are not happy, this is a battle and we are in a war and we are going to continue to fight day after day until our teachers get the compensation they deserve,” Colucci said.

More:Magistrate backs union request to use reserves to give Brevard teachers raises

More:Brevard school superintendent rejects magistrate's recommendation for teacher raises

More:'Silent strike': Demoralized and underpaid, 625 teachers have walked away from Brevard schools

More:Brevard Union rejects superintendent's new teacher pay proposal

Throughout the three-hour meeting, in which the union and Mullins office each had half an hour to make their cases, plus time to answer questions from the school board, two fundamentally different views of what was possible to budget came into focus.

On one side, the district, and ultimately most of the school board, argued for a conservative approach towards pay increases. On the other, the union backed the magistrate's view that the district has enough money available to support a pay increase that would bring Brevard teachers' salaries in line with state averages.

But the forecasts both sides presented relating to savings and expenses on a variety of budget items from teacher attrition to disaster preparedness differed by millions of dollars.

“I was hopeful that the school board would actually look at the special magistrate’s recommendation, the neutral party’s recommendation, rather than the flawed analysis of the CFO [Pennie Zeurcher], who time and time again is unprepared for these hearings,” Colucci said.

While board members Cheryl McDougall and Misty Belford expressed sympathy for the union’s position, they ultimately sided with the district.

“I do feel like we have to do more for our teachers in Brevard County… as much as I would emotionally want to approve $2,300 this year, it is something I cannot do,” Belford said.

Board members Tina Descovich and Katye Campbell appeared far more committed to their position in support of Mullins' plan.

“I’m not comfortable putting our district at risk without actual numbers,” Descovich said, critiquing the union’s financial assessment, to which an audience member yelled out that district CFO "Pennie [Zeurcher] doesn’t have numbers!”

Throughout the hearing, questions posed to Zeurcher concerning payroll and finance data in the district were answered with the response: “I don’t have that information with me.”

Descovich went as far as to say that the magistrate’s proposal would imperil the district and that she would rather have backed the district’s original raise proposal of merely 1.6 percent compared to Mullin's 2.3 percent plan that was ultimately approved. Descovich’s remarks were met by jeers and a few shouts of “Vote them out!” as the crowd began leaving the hearing in anticipation that the vote wouldn’t go their way.

Matt Susin — the sole nay vote on Mullins’ proposal — cautioned the board that they were making “a mistake” with their votes. He said that paying teachers less may save the district money in the short term, but that there were the incalculable costs of losing teachers with many years of experience. More than 600 teachers have left the district over the past three years in what has been dubbed a “silent strike”. At that point several teachers yelled out that they were on the cusp of leaving the district.

Speaking to reporters after the hearing adjourned, Susin explained his strong support for the union-backed pay proposal comes from his own experience as a teacher. He said that to make ends meet he would teach full days, giving up planning periods for an extra $1300, as well as coach a sports team and teach night classes.

“For instance I couldn’t drive my daughter down to the beach over the summer sometimes because we didn’t even have enough gas money,” he said, adding that “to say that the teachers don’t need the money is just not an argument.”

Susin remarked that Mullins for his part doesn’t disagree with that fundamental premise, the question is how to achieve higher pay.

“Some of the board members feel we can’t grab those extra dollars. They’re very tentative and that’s okay; that’s a conservative look. But as a former teacher who knows how much that education and experience [are worth], and how much the achievement difference in those classrooms is with a full time sub or a new teacher as opposed to a 13-14 year teacher who just went to Orange County, no comparison,” Susin said.

He reaffirmed that the board needs to work harder to come up with a budget that works for teachers, bemoaning the length of time it has taken so far.

Susin said he was dedicated to finding a solution and was prepared " go to war” in order to work towards a better budget.

Prior to the vote on teacher salaries, the school board unanimously voted to increase exceptional student education pay by $835 with a $165 one-time bonus. This proposal was agreed to by both the district and the union going into the hearing.

Contact Marazzi Sassoon at 321-355-8144 or asassoon@floridatoday.com.

Twitter: @alemzs