Teachers’ Candidates Oust Two Incumbents on Tustin School Board

Candidates backed by the teacher’s union have ousted two incumbent board members of the Tustin Unified School District, which was rocked by a teachers strike last month.

With all the precincts reporting, attorney Jane Bauer and teacher Gloria Tuchman won the seats of incumbents Edward Boseker and Dorothy Ralston.

Teachers in the Tustin Education Assn. went on a six-day strike last month to dramatize their contract fight with the district. They haven’t had a new pact since June, 1984, when negotiations broke down because district officials stated that they didn’t have the resources to fund cost-of-living increases.

Bauer was the clear vote-getter Tuesday night with 31% of the vote; Tuchman, a teacher in the Santa Ana Unified School District, took the second seat up for election with 25.2% of the vote. Incumbent Ralston, who was appointed in 1983 and was seeking her first elected four-year term, had 21.3%, while veteran incumbent Boseker took 19.5% of the vote. A fifth candidate, Jim McBride, an unaligned candidate who dropped out of the race the week before the election, took 2.9%.

Boost to Teachers

Union president Sandy Banis said the results will boost the spirits of teachers but she stressed that it wouldn’t mean an immediate change in the stalled contract talks. “Although there are two new board members, the problems aren’t just going to go away,” she said.

Banis said she expects Tuchman and Bauer will improve often cool relations between the board and the union. “I think it might at least bring some reasonableness to the board,” she said.

Bauer, although backed by the teachers’ association, said she isn’t fond of the “union-backed” label and said that she was backed by “doctors, lawyers and airline pilots too.” She said her own review of district finances convinced her that there isn’t enough cash to fund the teachers’ demands for pay increases. “I think it’s unfortunate that they weren’t offered retroactive increases,” she said “but the money just isn’t there.”

Despite that statement, teachers monitoring the results were ecstatic. “Hi, madam school board member,” said one schoolteacher as she called Bauer with the latest election returns.

Defeated incumbent Ralston said late Tuesday she doesn’t think the results will have a big impact on the negotiations. “I really can’t predict what difference they will make on the board,” she said.

Earlier Tuesday, District Supt. Maurice Ross said things have calmed down considerably since the strike, when epithets flew amid allegedly strike-related vandalism such as classroom doors being glued shut at one elementary school. “They seem to be getting back to normal faster than we expected,” he said. “There was some tension at first between the strikers and the teachers who didn’t walk out but it’s mending pretty well.

‘Fact-Finding’ Under Way

He said there have been no negotiations since the last offer in September although the two sides are in a “fact-finding” process, a prelude to bargaining.

About 60% of the district’s 410 teachers went on strike on Oct. 2, roughly the same percentage as the union’s membership. The district made an offer of 8.2 % for the 1985-86 year about a week earlier but the teachers rejected it because there was no provision for retroactive pay. The previous contract expired in June, 1984.

The district cannot afford to pay cost-of-living raises because of declining enrollment that translates into decreased funding because the school district gets $2,443 from the state per student, Ross said. Banis said the union feels the money may not be available but better financial control could make the difference. “Our contention is there may not be any money,” she said “but we feel they may not have been fiscally responsible.”

Quiet polling places. Story in Part II, Page 1.