20 Teachers Walk Picket Line Briefly

About 20 Anaheim Union High School District teachers walked an informational picket line Monday morning to protest stalled contract negotiations with the district.

The teachers, all instructors at Walker Junior High School in La Palma, picketed for about 30 minutes starting at 7 a.m., according to Leonard Lahtinen, president of the Anaheim Secondary Teachers Assn. Lahtinen’s union represents the 900 Anaheim district teachers.

Lahtinen said the union staged the picketing to solicit parental and community support for the teachers. He described teachers, whose contract expired last summer, as “tired and frustrated” by the situation. The last contract-bargaining session between the union and the district was broken off Jan. 23. A state mediator is to meet with both sides March 31.

‘Two Objectives’

“By picketing, we are trying to realize two objectives: The first one is to get both parent and community support. I think that it’s important that they realize that we have this dispute. The second objective is get the district to move on this--we don’t have to wait for a mediator,” Lahtinen said.

At the crux of the dispute is an impasse over union-requested contract language regarding teacher salaries. Lahtinen said that the teachers are not requesting a percentage increase in pay.

Lahtinen said that the teachers are asking for a contract that would guarantee in writing that any state monies received from Proposition 98 be added to the salaries of all the district’s employees--including the teachers.

Proposition 98, narrowly approved by state voters last November, requires the Legislature to give school districts proportional increases in funding each year, if funds are available. So far, according to officials, no money has been allocated to any school district.

Another union sticking point is a request that any funds from the district’s year-end budget that are not needed to supplant district reserve accounts be funneled back into teacher salaries.

Lee Kellogg, a district assistant superintendent, said it was the union that declared the impasse and walked out of the last bargaining session.

‘Not Successful Before’

“We were not successful before. It’s difficult to see how we could progress now,” Kellogg said.

Jo Ann Barnett, president of the district’s school board, said: “I have no problem with their right to picket. . . . They know the rules, they’re not interrupting the educational process . . . they’re being professionals. I don’t like it very much and I am sorry that we have reached this point.”

The union plans to continue the informational picketing at various school sites within the district until the dispute is settled, Lahtinen said.