There was no employee premium last year or this year.

By switching carriers and making the other changes, Burlington officials saved more than they would have if they’d kept their old carrier and implemented employee premiums, Smet said.

“We felt it was a better decision to change the plan than keep the present plan and have people pay more,” Smet said.

That’s because premium contributions don’t result in much savings — “people pay for it so they use it” — and because district officials didn’t want to “whack all of our people (with higher insurance costs) at once just because we could” without collective bargaining, especially since for so long in Wisconsin teachers chose benefit increases over salary increases, according to Moyer.

“We still want to be competitive to attract and retain high-quality employees,” he said.

The most successful companies, and those with the lowest employee turnover, offer good benefit packages, Moyer said.

But some in the community, including Roger Koldeway, a newly elected School Board member who has spoken out against many board decisions including this one, say district officials could have combined premiums and the new plan to save even more.