Our say: Panel: Fixing teacher salaries won't come cheap

IT LOOKS like the salary survey committee put together by school Superintendent Eric Smith won't have any surprises for the school board when it presents its report this week. Sobering numbers, yes. Surprises, no.

Everyone already knew that salaries for Anne Arundel County teachers had fallen behind those in other jurisdictions, and that the cost of fixing this would not be small.

The draft report by the committee confirms both points. Anne Arundel had the lowest cost-of-living increases among the state's 24 school districts in the past 10 years. Since 1996, county teachers' salaries have grown by 25 percent. That doesn't...