Union and Trustees Press Negotiations in Orange Unified

A teacher strike in the Orange Unified School District went into its seventh day Friday, with contract talks once again proceeding in an effort to end a 15-month deadlock over pay and benefits for the district’s 1,100 teachers.

Picketing continued Friday at the district’s 37 schools, and truancy among high school students remained high. The district includes all of Orange and Villa Park, and parts of Garden Grove, Santa Ana and Anaheim.

On-again, off-again negotiations had resumed Thursday at 1 p.m., but ended at 12:30 a.m. Friday, when a state labor mediator recessed the session. School district administrators and teachers’ union negotiators gathered again to continue talks at about 3 p.m. Friday at the Doubletree Hotel in Orange.

“We’ll stay here for as long as it takes,” Mark Rona, president of the Orange Unified Education Assn., said as talks were about to resume Friday afternoon. He indicated that negotiations could stretch throughout the weekend.

‘Not Too Far Apart’

“But maybe that won’t be needed,” Rona added. “We’re not too far apart on money. And if the district comes up with any new money, this could be settled.”

District officials, however, repeated Friday that the 24,500-student district is so financially pressed that no more money can be offered to increase teacher pay.

The district’s last offer was for a 2.54%, one-time-only bonus for teacher pay for the current year. The union’s last proposal was for a 3% regular pay raise retroactive to July 1. Unlike a bonus, a regular pay raise becomes part of the base salary to which future increases are added.

Jack Elsner, Orange Unified’s administrator for personnel services, said Friday that the district had not raised its money offer. “The money is still in the ball-park parameters we’ve previously discussed,” Elsner said. He added that during the Thursday night talks “we had a (contract) idea that might go beyond two years, but we just talked informally.” Elsner did not divulge what such a multi-year contract would include in pay each year.

Josie Cabiglio, a spokeswoman for the school district, said that 554 teachers, or about half the district’s 1,100 instructors, were absent Friday.

Strike Chronology

The strike began with a one-day demonstration on April 12. It resumed a month later, on May 12, with 564 teachers on the picket lines. On May 13, 650 teachers stayed away from classes, and 566 were absent last Monday.

On Tuesday, striking teachers returned to class for a one-day “cooling off” period at the request of state Supt. of Public Instruction Bill Honig, who indicated that both sides were not very far apart.

But when Tuesday’s negotiations failed to produce movement on the salary question, teachers at a mass rally in the Grand Hotel in Anaheim voted that night to return to the picket lines. On Wednesday, 589 stayed away from class, as did 515 teachers on Thursday.

Cabiglio did not have figures for absenteeism among elementary school students on Friday, but she described attendance as about normal. She said 1,265 middle-school students were absent Friday, as were 3,678 high school students. Truancy among the district’s four high schools has been high every day since the strike resumed on May 12.

About 200 parents and students came to Orange Unified School District headquarters in Orange at about 3:15 p.m. Friday, expecting to hear Supt. John Ikerd and school board members explain the district’s side of the dispute. Ikerd had said he would meet with two parent or student representatives from each school in the district. But when the delegation showed up Friday, Ikerd had been summoned back to the resumed contract negotiations.

Parents Angered

A school official apologized to the crowd and said Ikerd and school board members could not be at the session because of the negotiations.

But parents in the crowd expressed anger and disappointment.

“They told us they can’t talk to us because they’re negotiating, but I believe they’re lying,” said Cathy Cullins, a parent who said she had children at Villa Park High and Taft Elementary schools. “I believe they’re afraid of us. They don’t want to face us any more. This is their way of backing out.”

Another parent in the crowd, Cathe Carter, who has a son at El Modena High, said parents want an end to the deadlock between teachers and school district.

“I’m not sure what we’re going to do yet,” Carter said. “But (the two sides) are only $455,000 apart in this mess, and if a child gets run over and killed, that’s going to be a real small amount of money.”

Carter referred to union officials’ claim that only about $455,000 separates district and union in reaching accord on a two-year contract settlement. District officials, however, have said the money difference amounts to more than $1 million.