Teacher Unions Take Credit for Election Results

Tuesday’s elections again demonstrated the power of teachers’ unions in races for the Los Angeles school board and the Los Angeles Community College District Board of Trustees, union officials boasted Wednesday.

The final tally showed that liberal Julie Korenstein, a Chatsworth High School administrator who was backed by United Teachers-Los Angeles, polled 58.2% of the vote to defeat conservative Barbara Romey for the West San Fernando Valley seat on the school board.

Korenstein, 43, is the second UTLA-backed candidate to win election to the board this year. In the April primary, challenger Warren Furutani defeated incumbent John Greenwood, who incurred UTLA’s displeasure by opposing the union’s salary demands in the recently concluded pay negotiations.

In Tuesday’s community college races, three candidates backed by the college faculty union--attorney Wallace Knox, librarian Julia L. Wu and USC professor David Lopez-Lee--were the victors after a campaign marked by unrest over votes during the last two years by the Board of Trustees to seek layoffs of instructors.

Traditional Support

Wu’s victory over incumbent Marguerite Archie-Hudson, a Democrat who had enjoyed union support in the past, was particularly significant. The endorsement of Wu by the American Federation of Teachers College Guild deprived the incumbent of some traditional Democratic support that usually accompanies a union endorsement.

Although the races are nonpartisan, some Democratic Party activists grumbled that Wu, a conservative Republican, was featured as an acceptable candidate in AFT-related slate mailers sent to registered Democrats in the campaign’s closing days.

With her victory over Archie-Hudson, the board’s only black, Wu becomes the first Asian-American to be elected to the Board of Trustees.

Among those expressing delight Wednesday with the outcome of the elections were UTLA President Wayne Johnson and AFT President Hal Fox.

Johnson said he does not expect his union to “control” Korenstein but added that he thinks she will be “amicable” to union requests and concerns on educational issues.

“If she isn’t,” Johnson added, “we’ll try to do to her what we did to John Greenwood.”

Korenstein gave her thanks for UTLA’s backing at an afternoon victory party at a pizza parlor in Chatsworth.

“I owe this all to you very fine teachers,” she told a gathering of 75 instructors. “Without you, there wouldn’t have been this amazing triumph.”

Romey and her campaign manager, Paul Clarke, could not be reached for comment.

Fox said the returns in the community college board elections indicate “that faculty and other employees are an important element of the district and should be involved in determining the directions that the district goes in.”

Fox said he expects the new trustees, who take office July 1, to scrutinize the record of Chancellor Leslie Koltai and other top administrators of the nine-campus system, whom faculty critics have blamed for the district’s financial difficulties.

According to some insiders, Koltai, 55, may be in for some tough going as his contract comes up for renewal next year. The chancellor, who has held the job since 1972, wants an extension that will take him to 1991, when he plans to retire.

Trustee Harold Garvin, who won reelection in the April primary with the AFT’s backing, said Koltai will have to prove himself to two of the new trustees, Lopez-Lee and Knox, who have been critical of him but have not called for his ouster.

‘Produce . . . Quickly’

“He’s going to have to produce pretty quickly with some explanations or changes in policy,” Garvin said. “He’ll have to get back the confidence of the administrators and the faculty . . . or the board should replace him.”

During the campaign, Wu called for Koltai’s dismissal, arguing that new leadership is needed.

Reached by phone Wednesday, Koltai reiterated his position that he still enjoys the support of the faculty and that his 15-year record as chancellor is good enough for contract renewal.

“I hope to maintain the confidence of the people,” he said, “if I have the appropriate direction from the Board of Trustees and the appropriate funding from the state.”

Political observers interviewed Wednesday said the influence of teachers’ unions can be especially significant in low-turnout elections, in which those who vote tend to be committed in their choice of a candidate. Tuesday was no exception.

The turnout in the West San Fernando Valley school board race was low--13.2%. And in communities where the community college races were the only items on the ballot, including Alhambra and the Palos Verdes Peninsula, the turnout did not even reach 5%.

Times staff writers Elaine Woo and Pamela Moreland contributed to this story.