BEVERLY, MA – The Beverly City Council voted Monday night against interfering in any concrete way with the ongoing negotiations between the School Committee and the Beverly Teachers Association, the day BTA officials accused Mayor Michael Cahill and the School Committee of to have withdrawn from them the negotiating table.

More than 100 people – mostly in red – in support of teachers during a strike that marked Tuesday’s 12th anniversary of the city’s financial future and concerns about overstepping its role in the negotiations.

“The reality is that the current spending that the mayor has proposed and that the city council has become accustomed to supporting is not sustainable,” said Councilor Brendan Sweeney. “No matter the outcome of this vote, we face a dire fiscal situation after the next fiscal year.”

Sweeney went on to say he would oppose the resolution “because it undermines the work of our city’s negotiating team.”

Councilwoman Hannah Bowen introduced the resolution, which would have required the council to “respond with the utmost urgency to any additional funding requests arising from a finalized contract” and “work with residents and other city and state leaders to secure sustainable funding.” to ensure our public”. Schools, including living wages for our educators and healthy learning environments for our students, as well as our other essential services.”

City Council President Julie Flowers, Councilwoman Kathleen Feldman and Bowen voted to support the resolution. Councilors Matthew St. Hilaire, Scott Houseman, Steve Crowley and Sweeney voted against it.

“Whether a resolution is passed or not will not change what happens in this hearing room,” Bowen admitted. “We cannot and should not have this influence directly.”

But Bowen said introducing the resolution during the City Council’s special meeting provides an opportunity to have a public discussion – and show support for teachers, students and hopes for healing after the impasse eventually ends amid what Flowers called “the gravity and Uncertainty of what is called lies before us.”

That impasse showed no signs of ending Monday when BTA co-president Andrea Sherman said of Cahill and the school committee: “They have walked away from us. They left the city. They walked away from the children.”

School Board Chairwoman Rachael Abell pointed to a court order for a state-mandated “fact finding” if the sides fail to reach an agreement or, as she called it, make significant progress by Sunday evening. The BTA has repeatedly refused to take part in the “fact-finding” on the grounds that it would only delay the return to schools.

Abell said the union’s proposal remains $3.3 million more than what she believes “the city can afford.”

“We need an end to the strike,” Abell said on Monday. “Our students should never have left school in the first place, and they should not leave school today. Due to the BTA’s persistent and unrelenting demands, the School Committee informed the union that we will cease mediation while educators remain on strike and adhere to the fact-finding process mandated by the courts.

“We hope the BTA reverses its decision to ignore the law and ends its strike so we can reopen our schools at a fair price.”

Abell added: “The committee will resume discussions with (BTA leaders) once its members return to work.”

(Scott Souza is Patch Field Editor, covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at [email protected]. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)