L.A. Unified Reopens Talks on Pay Raise

After five months of wrangling, the Los Angeles Board of Education on Tuesday formally reopened wage negotiations with school district employees by offering a pay raise of slightly more than 1%, according to sources.

Under the district’s proposal, teachers and other employees would get the raise only if the district as a whole shows improvement in several of these categories: test scores, attendance, parent involvement, students’ English-language capability, the number of students who take college prep classes and an increase in Advanced Placement courses.

Each 1% increase costs about $27 million. The district’s seven bargaining units are in the middle of a three-year contract that provided 10% in raises. They asked the board to reopen contract negotiations and give them an additional 4% raise this year after discretionary revenue from the state exceeded expectations by about $60 million.

The board announced at its regular meeting Tuesday that it had agreed to reopen negotiations, but did not publicly disclose its initial offer. However, several sources close to the negotiations said the board offered a salary increase of slightly more than 1%.

“Every board member was in favor of reopening,” said board President Victoria Castro. “It is the intent of the board to squeeze every dollar possible for compensation without hurting the district. A high priority for everyone is attracting and keeping qualified teachers.”

She added that “the union wore me down. There are so many other issues to be faced by this district and I want to move on.”

Castro said money to pay for any raise would be covered by funds that are not attached to priority programs. “And I feel certain we won’t be cutting any positions,” she said.

The teachers union contends that the district has the money to support a 4% raise.

The union hired Neal Gluckman, of Nigro, Karlin & Segal, an accounting and consulting firm, to analyze the district’s $6.6-billion budget and determine whether money for the 4% increase--which would cost $108 million a year--could be located while still leaving enough to pay for new services such as libraries and tutoring.

Gluckman turned up about $98 million buried in the district’s over-budgeting of employee salary accounts and undesignated funds.

“Research consistently shows that the most effective way to raise student performance is through quality teaching--that is, you have to have a licensed, credentialed, well-trained, highly motivated professional in that classroom,” Day Higuchi, president of United Teachers-Los Angeles, said at a news conference. “How do you get high quality teachers? You pay a competitive salary.”

Higuchi has said he would agree to a raise tied to performance, provided it was based on evaluations of teachers by other experienced teachers. He said his membership would reject any measure based on test scores.