L.A. Unified OKs Size Cuts for English in 9th Grade

In its longest meeting on record, and one of its most contentious, the Los Angeles Board of Education begrudgingly approved funds to reduce class size in the ninth grade but put other initiatives on hold to reserve money for a teacher pay raise.

Deliberating into the early morning Wednesday, the board voted to temporarily set aside about $28 million of Supt. Ruben Zacarias’ educational initiatives--just enough to leave room for an additional 1% salary increase.

Board members argued sharply with each other and wrestled unrelentingly with senior district officials, who refused to budge on 26 proposals for everything from teacher training to computers.

The class-size reduction, which the board first rejected and then approved, would set a 20-1 student-teacher ratio for ninth-grade English.

The board’s set-to was precipitated by about $70 million in state revenue not included in the district’s $6.6-billion July budget. Zacarias wants to pump that money into schools and other programs; the district’s 75,000 employees are seeking a 4% pay raise on top of the 2% increase they received this year.

Faced with the need to choose between the employees, whose unions are a major factor in board members’ campaigns, and the superintendent’s initiatives, the board repeatedly deadlocked.

Board President Victoria Castro finally recessed the meeting shortly before 2 a.m., with 11 of the items--including library books and an academy for teachers and administrators--still undecided.

Each item generated a barrage of questions aimed at delaying or finding other sources of money for the programs. In the end, the board members were willing to kill only two expenditures, voting to hold several proposals for later consideration or alternate funding, thus leaving the money on the table for contract negotiations.

“This is the most dysfunctional we’ve ever been,” said board member Jeff Horton in a mid-evening outburst after his colleagues initially voted not to approve class-size reduction. The outburst apparently was more effective than hours of niggling, as board members scattered to the halls briefly and returned to change their votes.

Of the two expenditures killed, the only large one would have provided $7.15 million to match federal grants to build a 300-school computer network and train teachers in instructional technology. Failure to make the match will reduce the federal grant, district officials said.

Prior to Tuesday’s 12-hour marathon, board members met for several hours behind closed doors in an effort to hammer out a negotiating position on the pay raise issue. Those deliberations will continue next Tuesday before the board returns to the 11 budget items left uncompleted this week.

The district’s current contract provides a 10% pay hike over three years. But the nine unions representing the district’s workers say that salaries have not yet recovered from cuts of 10% made during the recession of the early 1990s. Some board members have suggested that they would consider a 1% raise now, followed by another 1% boost next summer if there is improvement in several measures of performance.

Although the board has signaled its intention to reopen the union contracts, Zacarias yielded no ground on his goals. Several times the usually tranquil superintendent showed distaste for the attempts to water down his programs.

“What would you spend that money for?” he testily asked board member Julie Korenstein, a strong teachers union ally, when she suggested that the district was rushing into ninth-grade class reduction and should wait until July.

In several instances, the board spent a half-hour or more debating much smaller sums, such as $330,000 for earthquake preparedness (approved) and $70,000 to make videos on school bond repairs (rejected).

Most of the decisions were far less definite.

The board, for example, approved more than $8 million for staff training in early literacy, English language development and math and science after a lengthy discussion that stemmed from a proposal by board member David Tokofsky. He suggested holding half the money in a kind of limbo until the district applied to the state for permission to replace it with grants earmarked for other purposes.

The largest item held back was the last discussed, coming up after board member Valerie Fields provoked sharp retorts by complaining that half the board members were brain dead by the time the late-night debate began.

The item at issue was a proposal to spend $10 million to tutor seventh-graders who are in jeopardy of being held back a grade next school year because of the district’s plan to end social promotions.

Under protest, Fields eventually joined Korenstein and Tokofsky and board member George Kiriyama in voting to put off a final decision on the entire item.

“I think this is a disgraceful way to make really important decisions,” she said. “I hope it will never be repeated.”