The Sacramento City Teachers Association (SCTA) has voted to authorize a strike by more than 92% across Sacramento City Unified School District (SCUSD). The vote approves the possibility of strike if, “Aguilar, Ryan, and [the] District persist in their unlawful behavior and avoid taking measure to correct their unlawful behavior,” said SCTA in a statement sent out to teachers across the District.
Last Thursday at a staff meeting, McClatchy took their part in this vote of more than 2,000 teachers across the District. They voted to strike 70-4.
“It doesn’t mean we’re gonna go on strike, it means that by a 70-4 vote, the teacher’s authorized the union to strike,” said Lori Jablonski, one of C.K.M.’s Union Representatives.
The District announced that they have sent an invitation to meet with District officials on March 26 and March 28 to begin negotiations and, according to SCTA: “give the District an opportunity to cure their unlawful behavior.”
The strike would focus on the District’s refusal to implement one of the agreements made by the union and the District to avoid a strike last year. The contract provided that savings found in teachers’ health care would be put directly into student needs, including smaller class sizes, more nurses, and more counselors.
“We have a contract that was negotiated in the mayor’s living room, ultimately; hand written by the mayor, signed by everyone in the room: signed by the superintendent, and all of the union representatives. The school board voted to approve that contract unanimously,” said Jablonski. “Now, a year later they are refusing to implement the health care portion of the contract.”
The District had taken steps to sue SCTA over this portion of the contract, an “unprecedented” move according to Jablonski. The judge sent the case to arbitration, which finished March 13. The arbitrators decision will be released in the coming months.
“Even if the arbitrator decides that SCTA’s interpretation was indeed correct, the district could still not implement the contract, and that’s where we might think about going on strike,” said Tim Douglas, another Union Representative at C.K.M.
“The Union has a right to do everything in its legal power to ensure that this contract is indeed honored, and a strike is within its legal right,” said Jablonski.
Douglas compared the District’s practices to that of Donald Trump, saying, “The old ways of doing things, the old paradigms of doing things have been thrown up in the air by the District in the same way that Donald Trump is changing the ways the established practice has been for a long time.”
“It’s truly unfortunate that teachers may be forced to strike to get Superintendent Jorge Aguilar, Board President Jessie Ryan and other District leaders to obey the law, including things as simple as agreeing to meet with us and honoring agreements they signed fifteen months ago,” said David Fisher, the President of the SCTA in a statement to teachers.
Jablonski and Douglas, both social science teachers, echoed similar sentiments about the mood amongst teachers at McClatchy. “I have been doing this for 15 years and I have never seen teachers so united in their belief that this is what is needed. Nobody wants to do this, but I have no doubt that teachers will do it. Just speaking at this school, I think there is a really strong sense that enough is enough,” said Jablonski.
“Nobody wants to strike because, A. the classroom’s gonna go to hell, and B. you’re not gonna get paid and everybody has a mortgage payment. But I do think that we are to the point that we are more than willing to do this after years of mismanagement at this District.”