Last month, we reported that San Diego’s teachers union was planning to ask the San Diego Unified School District to reopen the contract the two sides signed last year.
It is now official — and two other unions have jumped in, too. In addition to the teachers, the district’s classified employees and its para-educators, who work at the schools as teacher aides or library assistants, have also asked the district to renegotiate their contracts.
However, only the classified employees’ union made a concrete demand, asking for a 5 percent raise next year and for any savings resulting from changes in the district’s health care benefits be used for a further salary hike. The other two unions only made general requests for increased wages.
The most vague was the district’s first proposal, offering to “to negotiate equitable adjustments to total compensation (wages and health and welfare benefits) that are consistent with the District’s values, the District’s ability to pay now and in the future, and local, state and federal economic realities.”
The district said it looks forward to meaningful, objective and reality-based negotiations. Its labor relations chief has previously said that such contract re-openers are fairly routine and occur every year.