RICHMOND — A strike by West Contra Costa school employees entered its second day Friday after union members said no progress on forming a new contract was made during their latest discussion with district leadership.
West Contra Costa Unified School District leadership asked to meet with the United Teachers of Richmond’s bargaining team Thursday evening, but Union President Francisco Ortiz said the meeting wasn’t fruitful.
Union leadership was left waiting with security for 30 minutes and the district’s bargaining team did not come with an updated proposal, aside from raising what Ortiz described as “ideas” to address concerns around health care benefits, Ortiz said.
“We were hopeful that they were finally prepared to solve this crisis, but instead of solutions, we got theatrics,” Ortiz said during a press conference outside Helms Middle School on Friday morning. “That behavior was not only insulting to us, it was insulting to our students and their families who are waiting for stability.”
A district statement shared after the Thursday meeting had a different tone, asserting the parties were “making progress on our negotiations.” More is still left to discuss, the statement noted.
“There is no question that our District faces very complicated issues, many of them deep-rooted, systemic issues that demand our attention. My hope is that we can continue to work collaboratively to outline a path for moving forward with shared priorities and essential resource allocation,” Superintendent Cheryl Cotton said in the statement.
The parties remain divided over key issues.
United Teachers of Richmond, which represents more than 1,400 educators, psychologists, speech pathologists and other education professionals, is demanding a 10% raise over a period of two years. The union also wants the district to fully fund health benefits, reduce class sizes and case loads, and address facility issues like inadequate heating and cooling systems.
The district has countered with a 3% raise and an escalating contribution to health care benefits from the current 80% to 90% by the start of 2027.
Teamsters Local 856, which represents about 1,400 support staff from cafeteria workers to security, landed on a tentative agreement with the district which would have given members a 3% raise but the union voted down the contract and opted to also strike.
Unstable finances have plagued the district for decades. Previously known as the Richmond School District, the agency was the first to be taken over by the state in the 1990s and spent two decades paying back a $28.5 million loan.
More recently, the growing cost of doing business and a decline in student enrollment has caused expenditures to outpaced revenue streams.
Facing concerns from the Contra Costa County Office of Education, trustees agreed to a fiscal solvency plan that requires the district to cut nearly $33 million from its budget. If those cuts aren’t made, administrators have warned the district could lose local control, which could result in cuts happening anyway.
Adopting the union’s contract demands, or even more conservative recommendations made in a recent state-mandated factfinding report, could force district officials to make even more cuts, administrators have warned. No details on exactly where cuts would be made have been shared.
The unions have called for the district to reduce spending on outside contracts to help fund their contract demands.
David Goldberg, president of the California Teachers Association which represents hundreds of thousands of teachers across the state, shared concerns about the millions of dollars the district spends on contracting companies to provide services.
“Districts have to get this right. There’s no room for error,” Goldberg said. “We do need more state funding, but we also need districts to step up and really step into this moment.”
The Contra Costa County Office of Education has alternatively said the district’s contracting practices are borne out of necessity. When unable to hire full-time staff to provide vital services, the district has been forced to seek support externally, the office recently said.
It’s unclear when the parties will come to an ultimate agreement. Cotton said the district has asked the union to meet again Friday and district leadership has routinely spoken out against the strike, asserting the action is disruptive for the community.
“We hear members of our community calling for the strike to end, and that is the district’s hope as well. We remain committed to keep our schools open during the strike and are hopeful that our negotiating teams make progress to reach an agreement,” said district spokesperson Raechelle Forrest in an email Friday.
Meanwhile, union members said they’re prepared to continue striking for as long as it takes to see their demands adopted.
“Solidarity is a verb, and we are going to demonstrate it again and again until we get what our schools need,” Ortiz said. “We want to be in our classrooms. We want to be doing what we love but we refuse to accept the status quo that fails our children.”