SCUSD Trying to Break Teachers Contract
The Sacramento School District is trying to set a dangerous precedent of breaking contracts
By Katie Ferrari
Sacramento teachers have been fighting their district to get their contract implemented for nearly two years. Their struggle puts them on the frontlines of contract enforcement. If the district gets away with breaking the law and not honoring the legally binding contract, it sets a dangerous precedent for other districts and employers across the country.
David Fisher, president of the Sacramento City Teachers Association (SCTA), says that the Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD) “feels like [the teachers union] got too good of a deal…because we were too well organized, so now they’re reneging.” He points out that “other districts that have signed agreements that are going to be costly would like to have the precedent of a district like ours to be able to break a contract based on ‘inability to pay’ or budget problems, because if they are successful here, they can be successful in Oakland, LA, or anywhere else.”
District vs. the Union: A Play-by-Play
In November 2017, teachers won a groundbreaking tentative agreement with major concessions from the district three days before they were scheduled to go on strike. The three-year contract included three annual 2.5% raises, the first of which was retroactive, dating back to July 2016. The union also won an additional 3.5% raise in the 2018-19 school year for mid-career teachers to keep experienced teachers from leaving for higher pay in neighboring districts. Fisher says that mid-career teachers in Sacramento “made anywhere from $10-18k less” than nearby districts.
Most significantly, teachers proposed a way to fund the smaller class sizes and more student supports they were demanding. They would switch their healthcare to a less expensive pool and funnel those savings back into classrooms.
Nearly two years have passed since teachers won this contract, but it has still not been implemented fully. Instead, the district has done everything it can to renege on the contract. It has manufactured budget crises by hiring 18 new administrative positions (at an estimated cost of $3 million) despite a decline in enrollment and undertaking a $6 million vacation buyout for top administrators.
In November 2018, the district sued the teacher’s union in an attempt to break the contract on the grounds of financial difficulties. That December, the district refused to sign a memorandum of understanding that would put health plan savings towards class size reductions and student supports. Instead, they wanted to use the health plan savings to cover the budget deficits they had created.
The Sacramento County Superior Court settled in favor of the union in February 2019 and forced the district to return to salary arbitration. On May 2, the court-appointed arbitrator ruled in favor of teachers. They would get the additional 3.5% raise for mid-career teachers the contract mandated.
After losing the lawsuit, the district changed tactics and began threatening that implementation of the contract would induce a state takeover. In March, the district announced a $35 million budget deficit that needed to be closed by the end of the 2019 school year. On April 11, Sacramento teachers went on a one-day unfair labor practice strike to demand the district honor the written agreement that health plan savings be used to lower class sizes and improve student services.
A few weeks later, the district released its third interim budget and publicly admitted to making a $16 million mistake in budget projections by undercounting over 700 students in its enrollment. The union had been sounding the alarm about these faulty enrollment numbers since February, and an email leak later revealed that Superintendent Aguilar had known about the miscount as early as April 1.
Despite the $16 million “setback,” the district quickly set to work to create another budget crisis and impending state takeover that they could use to justify breaking the contract and directing health plan savings towards the deficit rather than students. This time, they chose to double the percentage of state-mandated reserves that are required for a school district to stay out of state receivership.
The state-mandated amount is 2%, but SCUSD produced budget projections with a 4% reserve and said they were incapable of meeting this amount and implementing the contract. Another $23 million was added to the budget deficit. Later in May, the Sacramento County Office of Education (SCOE) reviewed the district’s proposed budget and re-adjusted the reserve back to 2%.
Projections went from a $64 million deficit to “a $15 million positive ending balance” in a matter of months, Fisher says. “That’s a $69 million reversal.”
Local Media and Charters vs. the Union
Throughout this debacle, local media has taken its cues from the district. A week before teachers won their contract, the Sacramento Bee ran an editorial that exemplifies their coverage of this ongoing issue. The Bee slammed the union for CONTINUE READING: Choosing Democracy: SCUSD Trying to Break Teachers Contract
