Teachers Union Protest on Budget Cuts Has Little Impact

Most afternoons throughout her 20-year teaching career, Grace Chen could be found in her classroom long after the dismissal bell rang--planning the next day’s work, reviewing her students’ completed assignments, preparing enrichment lessons to push the brightest forward, consulting with her aide and making herself available for parent conferences.

No more. Like many of her colleagues throughout Los Angeles Unified School District, the Pacific Palisades fourth-grade teacher now goes home when classes end.

The choice is tough, she said. Should she put in the extra time and effort she always has? Or do what she is paid for and no more, as her teachers’ union has requested?

“It is a difficult situation for me,” she said, adding that she continues to work after school, only now “I’m taking everything home.” She said she and other teachers at the elementary school are united in their opposition to taking the massive pay cuts that are threatened as a result of the state budget crisis.

“These cuts are not right; we have to put food on the table and we have kids too,” she said, explaining why teachers at her school voted to be unavailable for the traditional fall back-to-school night, when parents meet their child’s new teacher and learn his or her plans for the coming year.

But the teachers are not alone. Administrators, parents, students and other school employees are also holding their breath as they wait to find out just how much worse things can get in this year of a spare state budget. This week, the commission headed by former state Atty. Gen. John Van de Kamp is scheduled to make its recommendations on how the budget should be cut, and the school board is poised to rethink the tentative $4-billion budget it passed in June.

The teachers union, United Teachers-Los Angeles, looking at a possible pay cut of up to 17.5%, has asked its members not to participate in any unpaid activities or paid extracurricular activities, not to do anything on their own time, and not to use their own money to buy things for their classes.

It has asked them to contact parents about “the crisis,” to question all district bulletins and directives, and to wear black ribbons and buttons, among other things.

So far, the protest’s results on the Westside have been uneven. Students briefly walked out last week at University High School in West Los Angeles. Back-to-school nights were hurriedly rescheduled for daytime at most schools. And a few after-school activities, such as school plays, music assemblies, mock trial proceedings and meetings of the school newspaper or yearbook staffs, were canceled here and there.

The union call appears to have had little impact. Palisades High School Principal Merle Price said that while administrators, not teachers, will staff back-to-school night, all extracurricular activities, including sports, are in place.

“I’m not gloating, I assure you,” he said, “but I think this reflects our teachers’ personal commitment to the kids and this community as they weigh the elements and make their personal choices. They have met as a group, and it appears that this (refusing to participate in after-school activities) is not their vehicle for expressing discontent with the district and the governor.”

Union officials, such as Jerie Morrison, West Area union chairwoman, say the protest is “not a tool, but a (recognition of) reality.”

“We are not trying to anger anyone but to alert them that things have changed and teachers are scrambling for mortgage money,” said Morrison, who teaches English and history at Palms Middle School. “If parents want (extracurricular activities), they need to come in and conduct them themselves or apply pressure to the powers that be downtown to cut programs and administration so that money comes to the classroom first.

“It’s true that they have not cut any money for programs,” she said. “There’s been virtually no change (from last year); it’s business as usual. But for teachers, it is not business as usual. We’ve always said they need to cut programs, not simply salaries. There are a lot of things that are not necessary, such as graduation events, football games and theater performances. They should be cut first.”

But many, including parents, principals and Westside school board member Mark Slavkin, say the union action is divisive and misdirected.

“They are putting the burden on the wrong people,” said Paula Sinclair, a working mother with two children at Palisades Elementary. “Although the teachers may be angered by the impending cuts--and I can empathize with them--teaching is supposed to be a little different from an ordinary job. It’s too bad their commitment to parents and children is so easily shaken.”

Other parents questioned the message the teachers’ action sends to students and said teachers’ refusal to attend back-to-school nights or to stay late for parent-teacher conferences will create hardships for working parents.

“And I didn’t even vote for Pete Wilson!” one father said.

“It’s terribly frustrating to me,” Slavkin said. “Parents and teachers are natural allies in the effort to hold the budget cuts and re-prioritize spending, and yet some of these tactics are backfiring. . . .

“Many parents are calling me, not to say they support the teachers, but to say that ‘We’re mad as hell about the teachers at our school and what can we do about it?’ These tactics are not effective in changing minds at the school board and do a lot to sour relations locally.”

Although the school budget the board passed in June did not slash basic programs or salaries, there is uncertainty as members begin work on the final budget this week. The just-passed state budget kept school funding at the same level as last year--about $4,000 per pupil--but provided no new funds for programs to handle increased enrollments. The city schools’ preliminary budget calls for cuts totaling $400 million, the bulk of it to come from teacher salaries.

Teachers now earn $30,000 to $54,000, depending on education and experience, for 180 days of teaching. They can earn more if they are bilingual or willing to take on certain additional duties, such as teaching adult evening classes. A union spokesman said the majority are “at the top end” of the scale and predicted “massive retirements” if the cuts are implemented.

In anticipation of no new money from the state, the source of most school funding, the board has already cut funds for maintenance, dropout intervention, support programs for bused-in students, counseling services and downtown offices. Now it may eliminate offices or programs deemed unnecessary by the Van de Kamp commission, an independent panel formed to assess the financial problems of the district, which will report its findings Tuesday.

Slavkin has suggested other possible cuts that would lessen the impact on teacher salaries. He says the district could save $5 million through energy conservation measures and, in what could be the most controversial option, could save another $5 million by eliminating funding for high school athletics.

“We should be able to find other ways to finance them,” he said, pointing to the city’s major league sports teams and sportswear manufacturers as possible sponsors.

There is also talk of layoffs, increased secondary class sizes, and a freeze on hiring substitute teachers.

With the uproar over impending salary cuts, Slavkin said the board may be forced to reconsider its reluctance to cut school programs or lay off employees.

After a public hearing Wednesday, the board will reanalyze each item, he said, voting on a final budget by the end of the month.

Meanwhile, principals at most Westside schools say they have not had to drop programs, increase class sizes or let teachers go--although there is a widespread misperception that they have.

“We have not gutted the school program,” Slavkin said. “But we are reopening the budget, going from top to bottom to see how we can strike a better balance between horrendous pay cuts and damage to programs and services. This next week is critical.”