Teachers’ Negotiations in Moorpark District Stalled : Bargaining: The main dispute is over the union’s demand for a new contract and the administration’s desire to extend the old one for three years.

More than seven months after impasse was first declared, contract negotiations between the Moorpark Unified School District and its teachers’ union have again stalled.

Officials said Friday that a resolution appears unlikely before the election of a new school board member Nov. 2.

“We’re miles and miles apart now,” said board member Tom Baldwin. He said the district administration roundly rejected the union’s latest proposal during a closed-door meeting with board members Wednesday.

“I’m very concerned, because there was just an almost total rejection by the administration of almost everything that the union was proposing,” Baldwin said. “I don’t think that all of the teachers’ requests are as onerous as they’re making them out to be.”

The breakdown followed a promising meeting Sept. 28 at which the sides appeared to be inching toward an agreement, union and school officials said.

The district at that meeting had offered a pay package valued at greater than $1 million. The major issue still unresolved was the union’s demand for an entirely new contract and the district’s desire to merely extend the now-expired teachers’ contract for another three years.

“The fact of the matter remains that we’re unwilling to involve ourselves in a multiyear contract without significant changes in the contract language which insures us that Superintendent (Tom) Duffy will honor the contract,” said Richard Gillis, Moorpark Educators Assn. president.

Teachers have been working without a contract since the start of the school year, and were not able to negotiate any salary increase last year, even though their old contract called for salary renegotiation for the 1992-93 school year.

The union declared impasse in March and a state mediator has attended the periodic negotiating sessions held since then. Gillis said that the promise of the September session quickly faded during an Oct. 8 meeting with district administrators.

“The superintendent was grossly unprepared,” Gillis said. “As a matter of fact, the superintendent is more interested in playing games than negotiating fairly.”

Duffy on Friday rejected the comments and said he is anxious to reach accord with the teachers.

“I want to get this thing settled and the board wants to get this thing settled, too,” Duffy said. “We’ve had good working relationships with (union) presidents before and this is different. The tone is quite different and it’s an inaccuracy that we’re trying to stop anything. We want to move along and get this done.”

The district has offered the teachers a retroactive 2% raise for last year, which would be incorporated into the permanent schedule used to calculate teacher salaries. School officials also proposed a new three-year deal under which teachers would receive a 1% on-schedule raise and the same health benefits this year, Baldwin said.

In 1994-95, the teachers would receive another 1% on-schedule raise and the same health benefits, and the district would agree to renegotiate salaries in 1995-96 under certain circumstances, he said.

The combined value of the offer amounts to more than $1 million. Gillis said he doesn’t necessarily have a problem with the figures, but he objects to extending the expired contract, which he says Duffy has been violating.

“We want to bring in stronger language that will ensure that he will abide by the contract,” Gillis said.

The union last week filed a unfair labor practices charge with the state, alleging that the district is forcing teachers to teach extra classes and not paying them fairly for the additional work.

Gillis said he is hopeful that the board and the union would again meet after the election of a board member next month.

“Things are in limbo right now,” he said. “But I think after the election we’re going to see some movement and I think we’ll return to a constructive, positive environment.”