Well, the LAUSD went to court today and won in their bid to stop the teachers' one-day planned strike on Friday, May 15, 2009. "Judge halts teachers' strike," by Howard Blume, 12:47 PM May 12, 2009
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/05/judge-halts-teachers-strike.html The story is very short but there were a few more details added by the reports on the radio. The bottom line is that the teachers cannot strike because the contract between the school district and the teachers union has a no-strike provision that was bargained for as any contract term. The strike would be a violation of the contract term and the strike would cause "irreparable injury" (something that can't be fixed by pulling out a checkbook and paying money). Of course any and every possible outcome (negative ones) that the district could think of was included in the request.
The union tried to say that the court was without jurisdiction to decide the labor matter but the court disagreed and based it's ruling on the fact of this being a contract matter and that planned action would be a breach of the agreed upon terms. The ruling determines that the no strike is permissible, so it's not like "May 15th" is not possible under the order, but another day would work as not specifically barred. That's not what the decision is about and you could see some unhappy people brought back into court if they try to work around the decision and strike anyway. Contempt of a court order can get people arrested and ordered to be incarcerated as punishment.
The ruling probably is the best thing for the union and they don't realize it. Walking out on Friday would have alienated what public support that they might have since the message is "we don't deserve to be laid off." Lots of people don't deserve it, it's just something that is done to save money. That applies to how a school district operates, too. The idea of a strike would also waste the day for the students, even if there are substitutes for coverage, not to mention that there would be more expense run up in paying for subs to come in. Thinking about the effect of the planned action didn't seem to matter in the union decision to strike.
The L.A. Times story that's linked here also has a lot of reader's comments and most of it seems to be pro-union and against the court decision, but the thinking still doesn't show any recognition of the issues for the court to decide and some of it is of the extreme type. It doesn't matter anyway for most posting their comments- the court order is going to be considered wrong by them and that's all there is to it. A few others express some reasons why a strike should be avoided and that's definitely not a part of the majority view appearing in those comments. Some people identify themselves as teachers but don't indicate how many years of service they have or what level they teach. Another talks of urging a strike anyway, (a bad move) but it sounded like it was from a non-teacher.
Any interpretation other than permitting a strike was going to get criticized. The ruling seems to be sound and it saved the teachers from going out to picket schools, and annoying some, maybe lots, of the parents. Yes, this was really a blessing in disguise for the union and saved them from losing more support that would have happened as they continued to work on avoiding layoffs. And that's the way the picture looks- not "saving their jobs" but "avoiding be laid off." The same general idea but "saving their jobs" is largely associated with individual actions for survival and the other is more like getting favored treatment that others don't happen to get. At this point, the teachers are ahead from a sympathy viewpoint.
The Board President, Monica Garcia, is on the radio talking about how they are getting early retirement benefits packages available for non-teachers now. That would save many jobs, she says. I don't know the actual terms, other than hearing that 40% of the employee's salary would be paid over time- I suppose in periodic payments like the how paychecks are issued. And then the pension benefit is there, too. So do they get a 40% of salary payment for a number of years AND the retirement benefit sum, or JUST the 40% payment? It seems that it's not a cheap way to eliminate employees, but there are lots of teachers taking early retirements. Lincoln High has a several of its own teachers retiring at the end of this semester and some have lots of years there- a few arriving as I graduated or soon thereafter. For the others, there might be a few that have been enticed by the lure of the "Early Retirement" deal.
The union could take their case further, but it's very "iffy" that the decision would be changed and it's more expense for what amounts to little practical purpose- people already know what they want and trying to leverage the LAUSD, as inept in management as they tend to be, still gets them no new wave of public support. And as I said earlier, a strike would get some people who have not strong opinion to form one, a negative one.
And time moves on, so look for more news soon.
Posts
