Holiday Pay Sought for 2 Days in ’91

An association representing more than 500 school custodians, bus drivers and other school employees in Ventura and Oak Park has asked the Ventura County Superior Court to force the two school districts to pay the employees holiday pay for the 1991 Gulf War days of thanksgiving.

The California Teachers Assn. filed separate requests for the court orders Thursday on behalf of all non-teaching, or classified, employees in the Ventura Unified and Oak Park Unified school districts, said Dave Stuart, a CTA staff member.

There are about 500 classified employees in the Ventura district and about 56 in Oak Park, including clerical workers and teachers’ aides, Stuart said.

The workers are seeking extra pay for working on two days in 1991 that had been declared by President Bush as national days of thanksgiving in the wake of the Gulf War, Stuart said.

The President had proclaimed the national observance for Friday, April 5 through Sunday, April 7. Both the Ventura and Oak Park districts held school as usual on that Friday.

But the Ventura and Oak Park classified employees contend that April 5 and the following Monday, April 8, were national holidays because of the President’s declaration. Stuart said Mondays are treated as holidays when the actual holiday falls on the previous Sunday.

The classified employees maintain they are entitled to receive 1 1/2 times their usual wages for those two days, which is their usual pay rate for working holidays, Stuart said.

But he added that the employees are willing to negotiate with the school districts to be compensated in some other way, such as through additional vacation days.

Although some school districts around the state have agreed to compensate their classified employees for working during the Gulf War days of observance, none in Ventura County have yet done so, Stuart said.