L.A. Schools, Union Agree to 10% Raise

Officials of the Los Angeles school district and the union representing its 32,000 teachers reached accord Wednesday on a long-running pay dispute, averting a strike that had been threatened for Monday and ending nearly a year of difficult labor negotiations.

After a bargaining session at the district’s downtown headquarters that lasted into the early morning hours Wednesday, both sides agreed on a union proposal that essentially calls for a 10% raise for the current school year.

The tentative agreement, which must be ratified by the Board of Education and members of the United Teachers-Los Angeles’ 21,000 members, concluded 11 months of what union President Wayne Johnson called “torture”--just in time for the beginning of pay negotiations for the 1987-88 school year.

Union’s Biggest Raise

Johnson said the 10% increase would be the largest one-year salary hike in the union’s history. It also is significantly more than the average raise of 7% this year for school districts statewide.

The offer was made possible by an unexpected overflow in the state treasury, a large part of which Gov. George Deukmejian allotted last week to public schools.

As a result, district officials estimate that at least an extra $22 million will pour into district coffers next year, enough to enable the district to pay more than the 8% raise it had proposed.

“I am grateful to the governor for doing what he did,” Johnson said at a press conference Wednesday. “Either knowingly or inadvertently, he played a major role in averting a teacher strike.”

Union members voted Tuesday to authorize a strike, which union leaders had said would begin Monday. Johnson would not reveal the exact tally but said the vote overwhelmingly favored a strike.

Board President Rita Walters said at a separate news conference that the board unanimously agreed to the 10% proposal. When the board officially approves the offer, which it is expected to do at its June 8 meeting, the 10% settlement will become the second-highest increase granted by a school district in Los Angeles County, she said.

Of the 43 county districts, the Lynwood Unified School District gave the largest settlement this year, 10.5%.

Entry-level salaries in Los Angeles will rise to $22,328 from $20,298, and maximum pay will go to $38,923 from $35,584. (The raise will be slightly more or less than 10% at certain spots on the pay scale.) If the offer is approved by both sides, the teachers, who have been working this year at 1985-86 pay rates, will receive the raise as a lump sum.

Lags in Nation

A district spokesman said the raise would significantly improve the district’s standing in the county. Nationwide, however, the Los Angeles school district still lags behind other large urban districts, including New York, Chicago and Baltimore in teacher pay.

Johnson said the offer will be presented Thursday evening to the union’s 350-member House of Representatives. If the house approves it, final ratification could occur Monday, when the full membership will vote.

The union has nearly 21,000 members and bargains on behalf of all 32,000 district teachers.

Supt. Harry Handler said the $22 million expected from the state will not change the gloomy fiscal outlook district analysts have projected for next year. The district still faces a $45-million deficit in the 1987-88 budget. To close the gap, the board is considering numerous program cuts, including eliminating music instruction, some counseling services and an after-school tutoring program.

Both district and union officials said they were glad to avert a strike and settle the pay dispute. The settlement had bittersweet overtones, however, for Walters and fellow board member John Greenwood, whom the union opposed for reelection in the April primary.

Opposed First Demand

Both board members had been supported by the union in previous campaigns but were targeted for defeat because of their opposition to the union’s original demand for a 14% increase. Walters won easily, but Greenwood lost to a political newcomer, Warren Furutani, who will take office July 1.

Tuesday was the first time in three months that district and union negotiators met to try to resolve the pay issue. Negotiations had broken down in February, when union representatives tried to bargain for the right to impose “agency fees,” or dues from non-member teachers, which the district has consistently refused to grant unless it won in exchange the right to transfer teachers from school to school.

Both sides later agreed to withdraw those issues from negotiation.

District officials essentially blamed Sacramento for the length of this year’s pay negotiations. According to Handler, the district was faced with limited resources from the state and legislative actions that kept changing its fiscal situation.

Another problem, some board members said, was that the district had enough money for a significant raise, as the union had maintained from the start of negotiations in June. The problem, as portrayed by the district, was that much of the money was one-time funding that could not be counted on next year, or lottery funds that are not a reliable revenue source. The district said, therefore, that it could not be sure that it would have sufficient funding to continue to pay the higher salaries next year.

One-Time Funds

Almost half of the $100 million the raise will cost will come from one-time funds or lottery proceeds, a district official said.

Johnson said the district’s problems with Sacramento had some validity, but he faulted the district for “playing with the numbers.”

On the whole, however, the union leader said he is glad the settlement has come so late in the year. “If we had signed off in September, before the new money came in, we would have looked like idiots.”

The teachers are working under a three-year contract that expires in 1988 but allows renegotiation each year of salary and some benefits.

A state-appointed mediator entered the dispute late last year but failed to bring about an agreement. Three-fourths of the district’s teachers participated in a one-day walkout in February to protest the stalled negotiations. Shortly thereafter, both sides agreed to submit to a review by an impartial fact-finding panel authorized by the state and required under state law before a public employee union can legally declare a strike. The panel issued a report last week that favored the district’s position in the negotiations.

THE SETTLEMENT The tentative agreement between 32,000 Los Angeles Unified School District teachers and the district:

Pay: 10% pay raises retroactive to last July 1, worth about $100 million. Starting pay is raised from $20,600 a year to $22,328.

Duration: The current school year.

Ratification: The union will vote Monday.