Angry Debate Erupts as County Strike Escalates

By NICHOLAS RICCARDI and RICHARD FAUSSET

Oct. 4, 2000 12 AM PT

SPECIAL TO THE TIMES

Job actions by county service workers escalated Tuesday, as people seeking public assistance were turned away from offices surrounded by pickets.

Part of the day’s agitation involved a mass rally outside the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors meeting, which led to a raucous confrontation between union members seeking larger pay raises and the political leaders who are resisting them.

“This board has worked in a way to be sure we can be a fair employer,” said Supervisor Gloria Molina after several fiery speeches by union officials. She was shouted down by hundreds of members of the striking Service Employees International Union Local 660 who had packed the hall.

As Chief Administrative Officer David Janssen tried to outline the county’s budget woes, he was greeted with cries of “Liar!” and “How much do you make?!” from union members, the majority of whom earn less than $32,000 a year.

Many cited the supervisors’ own $15,000 pay hike, which was granted by the state this summer, as they demanded raises of 15.5% over three years.

“We are tired of being disrespected,” said Alejandro Stephens, Local 660’s president.

The angry exchanges were only one escalation Tuesday in the intensity of the two-day-old “rolling” strike. The one-day work stoppages at various county agencies are scheduled to climax in a countywide strike on Oct. 11.

Each side urged the other to return to the bargaining table. County officials alleged that the strike is illegal and asked the county Employees Relations Commission to order employees to return to work.

The strike also moved to the sensitive welfare and children’s services offices, with the sheriff’s, district attorney’s and probation departments scheduled to be struck today. Though county officials said that hundreds of union workers remained on the job Tuesday, the walkout delayed critical services, providing a foretaste of what a broader strike might mean.

“It’s going to be sad because there’s a lot of poor people and we’ve got to eat every month,” said Janice Foster, 39, while waiting at the Canoga Park welfare office. Most welfare offices were asking all people with nonemergencies to return today.

At the Panorama City welfare office, Norma Rosales, a 35-year-old mother of four and nursing student, was turned away after being evicted from her apartment Tuesday morning. She was hoping to get the housing assistance that her caseworker had promised last week.

“I’ll find a girlfriend to spend a few days with, rather than go to a shelter,” Rosales said. “I already had to find a ride here because of the MTA strike. Now I get here and they’re on strike.”

Still, Rosales sympathized with strikers’ demands for a raise.

“They deal with a lot of people who are not cooperative,” Rosales said. “They deserve it.”

The county has offered the 47,000 workers represented by Local 660 a 9% raise over three years. Other county unions, including those for sheriff’s deputies and firefighters, have accepted that increase.

But Local 660 said it will take at least a 15.5% boost during that time to return members to their inflation-adjusted salaries of 1990, before their pay was frozen for four years during the recession.

The county, which has a $15-billion budget, has the money to grant the raise, at least for now. It has had year-end surpluses of about $100 million for the last few years that went toward one-time projects such as repairing aging buildings. The raises would cost the county $97 million over three years.

County supervisors warned that tapping into surplus money that fluctuates yearly would be risky, especially because the county faces a $184-million deficit in three years.

“Regardless of how long they strike,” Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky said, “we don’t have that kind of money.”

Strikers Hear Several Speeches

But outside the county Hall of Administration, the more than 1,000 workers who rallied before attending the board meeting had little sympathy for those warnings.

“They have office furniture. I can’t buy a car,” said Denise Leduff, 36, a clerk in the Department of Children and Family Services who lives in a South-Central apartment and makes about $21,600 annually. “They have a second house. I can’t buy a first house.”

A parade of union and elected leaders addressed the boisterous crowd, which broke into sporadic chants of “Shut the county down!”

“Sometimes people don’t understand who the county government is,” Los Angeles City Atty. and mayoral candidate James K. Hahn told the crowd. “My dad, [former county supervisor] Kenny Hahn, knew he wasn’t the county government. He knew it was you. He taught me that.”

State Sen. Tom Hayden (D-Los Angeles), who is running for a seat on the Los Angeles City Council, addressed Los Angeles’ middle class: “See in these faces, in these strikers, the images of [your] own ancestors at the turn of the century. . . . They were fighting the same fight as these people--to get into the middle class.”

As many union members as could fit into the supervisors’ cavernous hearing room trundled inside and cheered as their general manager, Annelle Grajeda, accused the board of ignoring the union’s demands and contributions.

Supervisors asked the union members to keep quiet, and they did during the testimony of Grajeda and two other labor leaders. But the jeering began when Molina

spoke and continued as Janssen began to rebut the union’s allegations, citing Local 660’s 12% raise over the past three years as evidence that “we haven’t been sitting here ignoring the workers and the employees.”

Janssen urged the union to return to the bargaining table, accusing its negotiators of walking away Friday afternoon and saying the county had further offers to make.

“If there’s more, David, it should have been on the table on Sept. 29,” the union’s strike deadline, Grajeda said.

Much of the public confrontation focused on negotiations, which have been suspended since Friday. County officials allege that the strike is illegal because county unions must go through a mediation and fact-finding process before walking off the job. Union officials say that is a voluntary process and their action is lawful.

By petitioning the Employee Relations Commission, the county is seeking an opinion from the three commissioners--nominated by labor and management and approved by the Board of Supervisors--that the strike is illegal. That could give added weight to any court challenge to the strike, said Tony Butka, commission director.

The county has vowed to get a restraining order to prevent health workers from shutting down county hospitals. The first hospital, King/Drew Medical Center, is set to be struck Thursday, though union leaders said emergency workers will stay on their jobs.

Today, strikes are slated for the Hall of Administration, where the assessor and county treasurer and tax collector’s offices are, as well as the district attorney’s child support and main offices and the Sheriff’s Department’s jails and stations.

Local 660 is calling on other county unions to honor its picket lines. Sheriff’s officials predict some disruptions but no risk to public safety from the one-day action.

Still, the Assn. of Los Angeles Deputy Sheriffs has told members that they must show up for work but are not required to substitute for striking Local 660 members who perform clerical and medical tasks.

“We are not going to aid and abet the Board of Supervisors,” association Executive Director Bud Treece said.

Times staff writers Zanto Peabody, Beth Shuster and Kurt Streeter contributed to this report.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Strike Schedule

A series of one-day strikes throughout Los Angeles County began Monday. Following are the departments that will be affected and the days walkouts are planned:

Today

* Civic Center

* Sheriff/jails

* District attorney

* Public defender

* Internal Services Department

* Assessor

* Treasurer-tax collector

* Auditor-controller

* Probation

* Public library

Thursday