The Center Square: Seattle Teacher Strike Looms Amidst District Financial Woes

All right Seattle's public school district and the Seattle Education Association continue contract negotiations today. School's supposed to start tomorrow on September the 2nd. But the only way to avert a teacher strike at this point is according to SCA and WAA to give in to their demands. Which are not just more money, yes they want more money than the district says it can give them. They want more special educators, they want some other concessions and they're gonna be likely out on the picket lines tomorrow instead of in classrooms. Now speaking to reporters yesterday at the John Stanford Center was Seattle Public Schools Superintendent Ben Schuldiner and my colleague Randy Diamond who covers the city of Seattle for us was there in attendance. He said we're not giving up, this is the superintendent, we're not giving up, we're gonna continue negotiations throughout the day on Tuesday and that is in fact happening today. But he said their financial constraints from the district make the teacher's demands really impossible to meet at this point and they are making contingency plans if in fact teachers strike. It's just so important that we do everything we can to open up schools on Wednesday. And at the end of the day that's it. It's the only thing I care about is making sure that our children are supported and loved and nurtured and educated within our schools and that's the focus. And in order to do that we really need to engage in thoughtful good dialogue with all of our labor partners. I'm thrilled that some of our other labor negotiations have almost finished, they're going very well and I have to really thank SEA for being a really thoughtful partner within this difficult time. And why is it difficult? It's difficult because we're broke. If we had money I would love to give it to everybody but the problem is we don't. And so when we don't have the money it makes these kinds of discussions and decisions very, very difficult. Now the Seattle Education Association, the union for Seattle teachers and other education professionals, about 6,000 of them in all, besides more money as I mentioned, they want more special education staffing and support services, they want their class sizes to be smaller and they want employee workload demands to be met. I don't have specifics on what those demands for lessened workloads look like. But Elizabeth knew at Washington Policy Center who heads up their Center for Worker Rights, she says people need to remember that public employees in the state of Washington are not legally entitled to go on strike. As a public employee you're an essential worker if you will, that harkens back to COVID doesn't it? But they're supposed to be there for the kids, right? And be in the classroom and figure out these negotiations as adults and don't punish the kids. But she says unless lawmakers come back in and put some teeth in that law and say okay here's gonna be the consequence if in fact you public employee walk off the job, there's no teeth to it and nobody seems to hold them to it. Often these strikes go anywhere from a few days to in some cases it has been weeks, the districts have had to make up. But she says again, without lawmakers coming back and putting some teeth in that law as it stands, nothing is going to change. Not only are students and students' families' schedules messed up for the year if this happens, your day-to-day work is screwed up if this happens, if you're a parent of young children, that's not okay. And strikes are prohibited. We need teeth in the law to make workers realize this more clearly. I think they're misled by their unions to think, hey okay, you can strike, this is the way we do things. That's not the way the law works. I never understand why, well, I do understand why that pay demands are coupled with legitimate issues involving students, right? There's a legitimate special education issue that's being debated and discussed right now. But depriving students of a taxpayer-provided education is not student-centered. This is not getting us where we need to go. We can have those discussions, educators can bring their concerns to administrators in a way that doesn't include depriving students of the school day. Now Seattle is not the only district facing a possible delay in the start of classes. The Tumwater School District is also supposed to start tomorrow on September the 2nd, but paraeducators there are holding out for more money. I wanna show you a Facebook post from the Olympia Paraeducators Union standing in solidarity with Tumwater. Hi, I'm Kent Reister. I'm the president of Olympia Paraeducators Association and I'm here today supporting the Tumwater Association of Paraprofessionals and I was hoping that you all could click this link to support them by sending a message to the school board because we already got our raise this year. They haven't gotten their raise yet. So click that link and follow it so that you can tell the school board and tell their district leadership that they deserve a fair wage. Now the Tumwater School District's latest post on the possible strike indicates that even though again it's only paraeducators refusing to be in the classrooms, teachers have already said they're not gonna cross the picket line. That's sort of anticipated, right? So there would be no school in Tumwater tomorrow if they don't reach an 11th hour deal today. So here's part of what Tumwater School District put up in their release about staffing beyond state funding. They said the state's prototypical school model funds 10.51 full-time equivalent paraprofessional positions to best serve students. The district locally funds an additional 124 paraprofessionals using mostly local educational programs and operations, so local levy funds. This total does not include the paraprofessionals that are hired on one-year contracts. So basically they're saying we're in a bind. We can only do so much with the funding that we have and we can't fund the additional pay increases that are being demanded by the union or the paraprofessionals. So that's Tumwater. I did reach out to the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction for comment. They typically stay out of these bargaining situations with the school districts and their unions, but I did receive this from Katie Payne at OSPI just a few minutes ago and she posted this or sent this to me in an email. While OSPI does not have a formal role in local budgeting decisions, we're closely monitoring the situation of both Seattle and Tumwater and we are staying engaged. These situations are always challenging for all involved and a work stoppage is never the first or preferred option. She goes on to say our students are entitled to a constitutionally protected basic education which includes more than 1,000 hours of instruction. No matter when a school district starts the year, those instructional hours will be provided. Obviously when schools doesn't start on time, they're gonna make up those days, make up those hours at some point, but there have been cases even here in Washington State where a prolonged teacher strike ends up applying for a waiver so they don't have to put in the whole 1,000 hours. That or they waive some of the, or make up the additional days when they had a snow day built in they didn't have to use or they might shorten a midwinter break or extend a few days at the end of the year. Those are all possibilities of impact. We end up with either or both of these districts walking off the job. So we'll keep you posted on that as soon as we know. And my colleague, Randy Diamond, is preparing to put up an article on our Center Square Washington page right after midnight when we have the final word one way or the other or if it comes shortly thereafter, we're gonna put up an article with all the details that families need to know.