Orange Teachers Picket at Schools

Frustrated Orange Unified teachers staged subdued “informational” pickets outside several schools Thursday--the second open protest against stalled contract negotiations in two weeks.

Holding signs reading “Settle the Contract” and “Stop the Migration: OUSD Recruit/Retrain Quality Teachers,” the educators stood on sidewalks before and after school, passing out leaflets about low pay and the departure of experienced teachers. Classes were not disrupted.

At Nohl Canyon Elementary in Anaheim Hills, about 20 of 25 teachers silently stood sentry as parents queued to pick up their children after school.

First-grade teacher Sing Wong was one of the few willing to voice her frustration at the labor dispute.

“We’re here because we’d like to have a contract,” she said, as a few people drove by and honked. “We’d like to have things settled. . . . I hope this [protest] will get the public to see that the teachers want to be seen as professionals and want the board to negotiate.”

This is the second open display of frustration by teachers in as many weeks. Last week, a quarter of the teaching staff, apparently angry at the contract impasse, staged a sickout against the union’s wishes. The absence of almost 400 teachers and counselors sent the district scurrying for substitutes, doubling up classes and drafting administrators and parents into the classroom.

Thursday’s action was a less dramatic expression of frustration, coming as the two sides prepare to talk budget figures, but not negotiate, on Monday and Tuesday.

Neither the union president nor Orange Unified School District’s spokeswoman knew exactly how many teachers participated in the pickets. At the very least, district spokeswoman Judy Frutig said, about 115 teachers protested before school at Yorba Middle School, and Orange, Villa Park, El Modena and Canyon high schools. She did not know how many participated in the afternoon.

“It’s disappointing that the teachers feel that they have to make this kind of statement,” Frutig said. “ . . . The district wants to settle [the contract dispute] as much as any teacher in any school.”

Union president John Rossmann said he expected 800 to 1,000 teachers to picket Thursday at all of Orange Unified’s 41 schools. He said the educators are weary of seeing veteran teachers flee in search of better pay to the detriment of education in the 30,000-student Orange district.

“They don’t want to settle this. They want this to go on and on,” he said outside Nohl Canyon. “The longer they keep withholding a salary increase, the more veteran teachers leave.”

Relations between the Orange administration and the union have been strained for years, but tensions have peaked in recent months. The crux of the labor dispute is the district’s wish to rescind a lifetime retirement plan promised years ago to teachers, who say they have forgone much-needed raises for years in exchange for retirement security.

The district agrees that raises are overdue, but officials say they can’t fund those and keep benefits without bankrupting the schools. The two sides are scheduled to meet, but not negotiate, next week.

Union leadership and the board are further separated by an ideological chasm--some teachers object to the board’s more conservative bent in recent years (as demonstrated in a December decision to bar a gay students’ support group from one high school), while administrators are inclined to describe the union leaders as radicals or rogues.

Negotiations have disintegrated since May 24, when the union membership rejected a tentative contract agreement that would have given a few longtime teachers raises of up to 13% and required a buyout of veteran teachers’ retirement contracts. The two sides dispute each other’s budget projections, and accuse each other of bargaining in bad faith.

It was against this backdrop that a dozen teachers passed out fliers detailing their contract woes at California Elementary School in Orange.

Christi Shaw, a mother of four students attending school in the district, said she has seen the outcome of teachers’ frustration. She’s noticed several teachers departing California Elementary, where two of her children attend. “They go to nearby school districts because they are not getting paid enough.”