Inglewood : School Board Picketed

About 75 classified school employees picketed outside a meeting of the Inglewood School Board on Tuesday night calling for new wage negotiations with district officials.

The California School Employees Assn., which represents nearly 600 clerical, custodial, security, maintenance and other non-certified employees in Inglewood schools, is asking for an 8% wage increase for the 1985-86 school year with the option of reopening salary negotiations for the 1986-87 school year. The employees have rejected two wage offers since they began negotiations with school trustees in July.

The employees--now in the middle of a three-year contract that expires in July, 1987--have the option of reopening wage or employee benefit negotiations in the second and third years of their contract. School district officials would like to negotiate for the contract’s remaining two school years, but school employees want to maintain the right to reopen the contract for the third year.

The most recent offer, made November 6, would have granted an 11% wage increase split between the 1985-86 and 1986-87 school years--in effect “locking classified employees out” of contract negotiations next year, said William Ruffin, a field representative for the school employees association.

“If the teachers have the option of returning to the bargaining table next year, so should we,” Ruffin said. The Inglewood Teachers Assn. is still negotiating its wage contract with the district, but school district officials said it is likely that teachers will retain the right to negotiate wages in 1986.

So far, neither side has made plans to reopen negotiations and Ruffin said a mediator could enter negotiations if a settlement is not reached by the end of the year.