Schools, Union Reach Accord on Assistants

No teaching assistants will be laid off before the end of the school year in June under a tentative agreement worked out between San Diego city schools and labor union negotiators.

Layoffs of some of the 3,300 assistants will probably occur after that time, but the agreement, many details of which must be made final next week, is reportedly structured to minimize the number to be fired and any resulting disruption to classroom instruction.

Reliable sources said that the union allowed the district to accept liability for back wages and benefits of about $500,000, far less than the $25 million it could have faced as a result of the legal issues behind the negotiations.

The two sides released a brief statement Thursday outlining the tentative settlement, which addresses the fact that the San Diego Unified School District has for years violated state law in the way it hires teaching assistants, who are vital at many schools as classroom aides, clerks, and playground and campus security supervisors.

For years, the district hired people for the part-time hourly positions and paid no vacation, sick leave or health benefits, despite state education codes that require special circumstances in order for the workers to forgo those normal fringe benefits.

The state code allows exceptions only for aides who are full-time college students or otherwise receive specific certification as classroom assistants.

The negotiations began after the district conceded that it had indeed acted contrary to law and would not contest an effort by the Classified Employees Assn., a labor union, to represent teaching assistants. The union covers employees who are not recognized as full-time teachers by the state of California.

CEA President Susan Hoppe and district negotiator Ann Wright jointly released the statement to principals and teaching assistants.

The agreement calls for no layoffs through the end of the 1990-91 school year, for the district to set up a legal certification program for classroom assistants who qualify, and for all other hourly employees to be converted to permanent monthly salary schedules by July 1. Those converted to new pay schedules will receive sick leave and vacation in addition to salary, and will also gain health benefits if they work more than four hours a day. Both the district and the monthly employees will also have to begin paying Social Security.

The statement said also that seniority rights and layoff procedures had been agreed to for the 1991-92 school year beginning in July, but said details would not be available until late next week.

The 500 or so assistants who are full-time college students will be exempt from these provisions under the education code, Hoppe said Thursday. But she said an unresolved issue remains over the union’s contention that those students must be laid off before any permanent monthly employees are let go.

The new certification program, to begin as soon as practical, will allow the district to treat more assistants as hourly workers without benefits if they work in a classroom, attend college or university full- or part-time in a regular teacher training program, and receive a two-year certification through the county Office of Education.

Depending on the number of assistants who become exempt from permanent pay schedules, the district will determine how many others it can afford to retain after the end of the school year. But for each one, the district will have to pay $320 in health costs per month per employee, with the specter of a projected budget shortfall of $37 million and the need to pay back wages and benefits to some longtime assistants.

“We’re trying to minimize institutional disruption through the end of the year and hoping that perhaps, with attrition over the summer, if people find other jobs, we may minimize layoffs next fall,” Hoppe said. “But yes, I do expect there will be fewer teaching assistants next fall.”

Although Hoppe refused comment on the $500,000 in back payments that district sources say has been agreed to, she did say that the union “did not insist on the full amount we believe we are entitled to” because many teaching assistants argued that “our first obligation was to save as many jobs as possible and think about the kids as much as possible.”

Some of the teaching assistants said they did not want benefits because they are full-time students and want to keep their jobs for as long as possible, Hoppe said.

“And we also didn’t want to go the way of the Eastern Airlines union,” she added, referring to the airline shut down by a management unable to pay legally required labor costs.

The district this week was forced to cut $1.5 million from the transportation department budget, including the elimination of 16 positions, because of illegal hiring similar to that at issue with the teaching assistants.

The district is paying about $540,000 in back wages and benefits to settle a suit brought two years ago by 94 bus drivers who claimed the district hired them as hourly employees under the education code, even though it knew they never attended college or were not full-time students.

Had the CEA gone to court to claim a similar settlement and won, the district would have been liable for as much as $25 million in back payments, Hoppe said.