Some 3,000 Sacramento teachers were forced into a 1-day strike on April 11 over lousy school conditions, and the district’s labor law-breaking.
And, unlike the wave of forced teacher strikes around the country that started just over a year ago in West Virginia, in this case, the two go hand-in-hand.
That’s because the Sacramento City Unified School District board broke its contractual commitment to its teachers to spend money to improve classrooms for the city’s kids – and the school board fired 150 teachers at an illegally closed meeting, to boot.
Both practices break state labor law, making the Sacramento walkout the first in the U.S. over such management illegality. It’s the first strike by Sacramento teachers in 30 years. The Sacramento Teachers Association filed 31 labor law-breaking – formally called unfair labor practices – charges with the state board.
The SCTA, a National Education Association local, signed a contract with the contract just over 16 months ago. To avert a strike, the district pledged to spend millions of dollars to improve classroom conditions. Superintendent Jorge Aguilar and the school board reneged.
Aguilar and board members contend they need to cut $35 million, mostly in health care costs, instead, to avoid a state takeover. The union points out that during bargaining it offered – and the district accepted – a plan to retain health care while still cutting almost half that sum, some $15 million-$16 million.
The rest of the cuts, the two sides agreed, would come from administrative overhead. Instead, Aguilar hired and paid more high-salary administrators.
"This is to ensure SCUSD management keeps its promises to our students,” union President David Fisher, a second-grade teacher, told NEA. “Administrators simply need to honor the contract and obey the law. Our superintendent and school board talks a good game about ‘equity, access and social justice.’ It appears to be just talk, which is why Sacramento’s educators today will just walk.”
20-year English teacher Kara Synhorst posted a Facebook video adding: “I’m offended and insulted at the way teachers are being portrayed. My union has offered ways for the district to save money. If anyone is refusing to come to the table, it’s Mr. Aguilar and the district. We have a contract. Don’t ask us to negotiate a new one when you won’t even implement the last one — because my students already know: A deal is a deal.”
(PAI)
