I spoke this morning with several persons who suggested writing the story in advance of this afternoon’s 4:45 special School Board meeting at the District Offices.
The unusually early starting time for perhaps a 90-minute assembly may make the composition of the audience more intriguing than the dialogue. Public comment, the centerpiece of the meeting, probably will consist members and leaders of the two unions repeating their understandable mantra of “You should cut them not us.”
Most years most teachers are safer than a newborn inside five layers of clothing on a day when the mercury dips below 80.
However, at the risk of cavalierly ignoring crucial details, the stress for teachers and their families of receiving a potential layoff every year ahead of the state-ordered March 15 deadline is the kind of pressure that jangles nerves when you are trying to sleep, rocks marriages and tests families.
I cannot imagine the heat described a couple weeks ago by the head of the English Dept. at Culver City High School. She said this is the fourth time in five years she has been notified.
Drawing a Comparison
That reminds me of the daily rockets that Israel’s friendly Arab terrorist neighbors fire from the Garbage Strip into Israel. In a three-day period over the past weekend, the charming Arabs, who can’t afford to join the Better Terrorist Business Bureau, launched 130 rockets into Israel causing no significant damage. So? The rockets are described as “wildly inaccurate.” But they could strike a person. Imagine the wooliness of your nerves, waiting for them or hearing them.
Similarly for the pre-March 15 letter declaring that You Are Eligible to be Laid Off This Spring. You probably won’t be. But you could be, which affects your financial planning and your psyche.
From here, though, teacher employment looks far safer than working for the city, since hardly any teachers are expected to be subtracted, based on recent history.
Last week City Manager John Nachbar warned than 100 city workers could be pink-slipped in the coming months unless the six municipal labor unions. That statement was surrounded by diplomatic shrubbery, but Mr. Nachbar does not blow smoke and doesn’t introduce layoff numbers for the value of the echo. At the core, he is no-nonsense, and that persona message has been sent across the table.
