TIVERTON — Amid the continuing rancor over an unsettled teachers’ contract, School Committee member Leonard Wright injected a conciliatory tone.

The town has high-performing schools and high-performing teachers, he said,

“I don’t think we should put them in the position of putting them behind” financially, Wright said.

“We should find another way to balance the budget,” he said.

In the end, the rest of the committee took his advice — to the extent that it put off making any decisions that would ask teachers to take a cut in pay during the next school year.

After the meeting, Amy Mullen, president of the teachers’ union, said she applauded Wright for quickly realizing that teachers would end up with a pay cut and “stating that it wasn’t fair.”

During the session, Deborah Pallasch, a parent, urged the committee to settle the teachers’ contract — and finalize the current budget — before it revisits projections for the next fiscal year.

As School Committee member Jan Bergandy pointed out, there is no legal commitment to the salary figures penciled into the current budget.

Pallasch, picking up on his remark, said that 70 percent of the costs in the current budget are “unknown.”

“That money is soft money as long as the contract is not settled,” she said.

And she said she agreed with Wright that “we should be reasonable” toward the teachers.

Schools Supt. William J. Rearick presented the committee with three scenarios for next year’s budget that pit salaries against rising out-of-pocket premiums for health care, with teachers ending up in the red.

His presentation, in the high school auditorium, was accompanied by disapproving murmurs from the audience, which included the union leadership and other teachers.

Wright said one of Rearick’s options would give teachers an added $1,300 in salary — a raise of about 2 percent for those with the most experience — but make them pay $3,500 toward the cost of a family health insurance plan.

That figure, more than triple the $1,100 teachers now pay for family health care, represents about 25 percent of the total cost of a family premium.

Until now, Rearick has proposed a 2 percent increase for teachers next year along with an 18 percent share of the health care premium.

But he said last night that offer would leave the budget in the red.

Christopher Cotta, chairman of the town Budget Committee, encouraged the School Committee to approve a bottom line that conforms to new property tax relief legislation and figure out the line items later.

While the Town Charter required the School Committee to send the Budget Committee a budget yesterday, Cotta said that in reality his panel does not need firm figures until sometime in March.

The committee tentatively agreed on a budget of $25,381,837, which allows for an increase of $965,413 in tax revenue, a sum that would raise the property tax contribution to the schools to $20,273,667 from $19,308,255.

That revenue figure is about $149,000 short of the total expenses that Rearick has laid out in his proposed spending plan for next year.

Last night, Rearick said he needed “direction” from the committee concerning areas where he could look for cuts. The superintendent had earlier proposed eliminating programs by laying off several teachers, but the committee told him to leave programs alone.

Meanwhile, Mullen, the union president, asked the committee for a “plan” to address the absence of a senior projects coordinator this year.

Such a position was not established before the teachers’ contract expired last August,

But for the first time, seniors graduating in June will be required to complete special in-depth projects to receive their diplomas. These independent studies entail not only academic research but field work in the community under the supervision of an adult mentor and a culminating presentation of their findings.

Rearick said the school administration will consider volunteers for the coordinator’s position.

Lynn Nicholas, a member of the union executive board, said the teachers had proposed a memorandum of understanding that the position of senior projects coordinator would be created in the next contract.

Rearick said the School Committee hadn’t received such a proposal from the union.

“That’s not true,” Mullen and other teachers shouted from their seats in the audience.

gmacris@projo.com