In the wake of today’s first public disclosure of proposed bargaining agreements for the School District’s Teachers Union and for the non-teachers’ union, the first numbers to attract attention were the approximate 2 percent increases for each of the next three years, including the present one.
This may be the best news teachers have seen for years.
Technically, the increases are listed as 2 percent for this year, retroactive to last July 1, 1.96 percent for the next fiscal year and 1.92 percent for the year after that.
A deep bow goes to Gov. Brown’s pet project, Prop. 30.
After an unbroken string of financial crisis periods, the School District is returning to financial stability, as Mike Reynolds, assistant superintendent for finance, explains. Kind of like found money (although Mr. Reynolds did not use the phrase) – Prop. 30, which California voters passed last November.
Several factors fed into the calculus.
“Prop. 30 took away the budget axe that was hanging over the heads of all the school districts in the state,” Mr. Reynolds said. “Besides that, you look at COLA (cost-of-living increase) and efforts to reduce our ongoing deficit. We have made good strides in that area.”
Those three elements underpinned the green-colored good news for teachers and non-teachers.
“The 2 percent is a raise in perpetuity,” Mr. Reynolds said.
“Then to satisfy the state, you have to show the effect over the next three years. It is not as if it were 2-2-2.
“After a 2 percent raise this year, the state steps in and says, ‘Maybe you can afford it this year. But when it starts to roll forward, increasing your salary schedule on an ongoing basis, you have to show you can afford out over the next three years.’”
Mr. Reynolds said this morning that the Los Angeles County Office of Education has verified that the School District is financially capable of making the three-year pay increase pledge.
“They have told us we are in good shape, financially,” he said.
