Teachers OK Pact With 3% Pay Cut : Education: District agrees to repay the money with interest by 1995, but both sides concede further budget woes may prevent that.

Conceding that the Los Angeles Unified School District is in its worst financial shape in decades, the system’s teachers have voted overwhelmingly to accept a contract that guarantees repayment by 1995 of the 3% cut from their salaries this year.

With 18,000 of the 30,000 members of United Teachers-Los Angeles (UTLA) casting ballots this week, the one-year contract was approved by 83% of the teachers, counselors, librarians and nurses the union represents. The vote lifts the threat of a spring semester strike that would have disrupted classes for the district’s 640,000 students.

“I think teachers are relieved that there won’t be a strike, but I haven’t spoken with one person who was happy about being asked to vote for a pay cut,” UTLA President Helen Bernstein said Thursday after the votes were tallied. “But teachers are realistic. They know that things are difficult for everyone economically these days.”

The contract settlement, reached last week after seven months of negotiations, ensures that teachers will be repaid, with interest, the money cut from their paychecks this year to help balance the district’s $3.8-billion budget. The average amount lost from paychecks this year will be about $1,300.

The agreement also allows teachers to begin the next school year in July with their salaries restored to the 1990-91 level, although officials on both sides acknowledge that pay cuts may be necessary again next summer if the district continues to face a funding shortfall.

“This is all done in good faith, but we all recognize that there is still a financial crisis in the state,” Deputy Supt. Ruben Zacarias said. “But at least for now, we’re pleased that we’ve resolved the (salary) issues and can unite to work on the bigger challenges facing us in public education here in California.”

After talks with employee unions deadlocked last month, the school board voted unanimously to cut 3% from the pay of all the district’s 58,000 full-time employees and impose unpaid furloughs of two to five days this year, to save more than $85 million and help close a $275-million budget gap.

The pay cuts were endorsed by state fact-finding panels, and followed a series of money saving measures, including an increase in class size, reductions in administrative spending, and pared down maintenance and custodial services.

Board members argued that the nation’s second-largest district faced financial insolvency if the salary cuts were not enacted. They pledged to repay employees next year, but only if the district received additional funding from Sacramento--an unlikely scenario, given the state’s growing budget deficit.

The new teachers’ contract removes that contingency and gives the district four years to repay the money that was cut at a rate of at least 0.5% a year.

District officials say they will extend the repayment to all employees, which will cost the district at least $11.7 million annually.

Negotiations are still under way, with unions representing police officers, classroom aides, bus drivers, custodians, clerical workers, plumbers, electricians, carpenters and others. In October, the district settled on a contract with its school principals’ union that included the 3% pay cut.

Teachers had been working without a contract since June, when their three-year pact, which had included 8% annual raises, expired. The new contract will expire June 30.

In addition to the pay-back provision, the contract restores substitute teacher coverage in high schools, which was scheduled to end on some campuses next semester because the board had cut the fund used to pay them by 40%.

The settlement requires the district to transfer $6.8 million from its reserve account to pay for substitute teachers next semester. Without that money, high school teachers would have had to give up their free periods to cover for absent colleagues. An incentive program offering teachers bonus sick days in 1992-93 if absenteeism is cut next semester could allow the district to recoup that cost.

“We think that’s a major victory, not just for us, but for all the high school students in this district,” Bernstein said.

The settlement specifies that the union be consulted as the district considers changes in the way student performance is measured. Supt. Bill Anton has said he intends to include student achievement in evaluating teachers and principals, and union leaders had been concerned that teachers would be unfairly penalized if their students did not perform well.

“The district has been saying, ‘You need to trust that we’re willing to change the way we do business,’ and we’re saying to them, ‘You need to trust us and make us partners,’ ” Bernstein said. “I think this contract accomplishes that.”