Palmdale teachers vote 3 to 1 to reject tentative contract
PALMDALE — By almost a 3-to-1 margin, teachers in the Palmdale School District rejected a tentative contract agreement reached two weeks ago after nearly two years of negotiations.
If approved, the contract would have maintained no-cost benefits for teachers until the 2007-08 school year, when the new contract expires. Teachers again would have given up a pay raise on the exchange, as they have since 2000.
Whatever the cost of the most expensive health plan offered to teachers in 2006-07, that amount would become the maximum district contribution for the next year.
The sound rejection by teachers, 602 voted no; 218 said yes, throws the process back into uncertainty.
A state mediator must now decide whether to reopen negotiations or to move onward to fact-finding, wherein a third party would analyze the district’s budget and determine just how much teachers can ask for in compensation.
The president of the Palmdale Elementary Teachers Association, Simone Zulu, said teachers were solidly against a limit on the district’s contribution toward health care.
“From the meetings we had, people were not very happy with the cap,” Zulu said. “They felt the district could do better, and they didn’t like the idea of negotiating for two years down the road.
“They basically were taking it as the district trying to pull a fast one.”
Superintendent Jack Gyves said he was not surprised by the no vote.
“I think the employees had been led to believe that there is money, and there is none,” he said. “We presented to the negotiating team our last, best offer, and it was just that, what we could afford. Apparently, it wasn’t acceptable.”
Trustee Robert “Bo” Bynum sat in on the negotiations. He was disappointed by the rejection.
“I think the pressure is on both sides to keep working,” he said. “We’re dealing with people’s lives here. Somewhere along the line, the truth of the resources has to come out.”
Bynum has said in the past that he favors giving teachers as much as the district can afford.
“As a trustee, my first concern is to make sure the district is solvent,” he added. “From there, my allegiance is to the employees of this district.”
With the school year over, neither side is sure what will happen over summer vacation. It could give time for more negotiations, or it could be a cooling-off period. Teachers have vowed to keep fighting.
“With the no vote comes a lot of work. The teachers understood that, and from what I’m hearing, they’re willing to work for a better contract,” said Zulu. “And by any means necessary, that’s what I’m hearing.”
She added, “We had 820 teachers vote on this tentative agreement, so I’m putting 820 teachers responsible for getting what we want.”
At a meeting of the union’s governing body Monday night, representatives voted to recommend that teachers boycott summer school.
“There’s going to be summer school, I’m sure, but we’re recommending that our members not participate in it,” Zulu said. “It’s their own decision.”
Superintendent Gyves didn’t think much of the summer school protest. “Who does that hurt? We’re a program-improvement district,” he said. “We all have a choice. We can do these things on our own, or we can let someone else come in and do them. Not doing summer school only affects the kids.”
The teachers’ current contract expires at the end of this month, but no one is sure what will happen if there isn’t a new deal in place by the start of the fall semester.
Table of contents for Palmdale's long contract fight
- Palmdale teachers vote 3 to 1 to reject tentative contract
- Dreaded ‘cap’ threatens to derail contract deal