Teachers Back Non-Members’ Union Fee

Teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District have voted overwhelmingly to require non-union teachers, counselors, nurses and librarians to pay the union a service fee, amounting to about $350 a year, to work in the district.

About 22,000 of the district’s 35,000 credentialed employees--union members and non-members--cast secret ballots in the monthlong vote. The final vote was 14,362 to 7,009. Votes were counted Wednesday by the state Public Employment Relations Board, which will decide the amount of the fee and when it will begin.

United Teachers-Los Angeles represents about 23,000 of the district’s teachers, but the union bargains for salaries and benefits for all the district’s credentialed employees, which includes counselors, librarians and nurses.

“For years, UTLA has been required to represent both members and those who chose to be non-members equally, with members’ dues paying for everything,” said Catherine Carey, union spokeswoman. “We think the vote assessing a service fee to non-members is only fair.”

Union members pay dues amounting to 1.5% of a beginning teacher’s salary--about $400 a year. Non-members would pay about 90% of that, which has been deemed the cost of providing contract negotiations and other representational services, but not lobbying or recruitment activities. A recent state Supreme Court ruling barred teachers’ unions from using the fees over teachers’ objections for political activities.

The “agency shop” fee proposal was approved 5 to 2 by the school board in September, on the grounds that it is not fair for non-union members to benefit from collective bargaining agreements without having to contribute dues to the union.

The fees will add about $1.8 million to the union’s annual $5-million budget.

“Not only will we have more resources to assist members and non-members now, but we think this will unify the bargaining unit,” Carey said.

Relations between union and non-union teachers were acrimonious during last spring’s nine-day strike, when many non-union teachers crossed picket lines.

At a hearing before the board on the issue of service fees in September, several teachers spoke out against the fees, saying they should not be forced to support a union they disagree with.

But union members complained that those teachers were getting a “free ride” by reaping the benefits of the contract the union negotiated--granting teachers a 24% raise over three years--without having to contribute to the union.