Overview:
After 10 months of fruitless contract negotiations, WCCUSD teachers on Monday announced they'll go on strike starting Thur., Dec. 4.
This means that, barring any last-minute settlement with the district, 1,500 teachers will not be in their classrooms.
The district said Monday that schools will remain open, meals will be served, and students will "remain safe and engaged in learning activities."
This story was updated Tuesday morning to include WCCUSD’s response to the strike announcement.
United Teachers of Richmond, which represents 1,500 WCCUSD educators, announced Monday night at 7 p.m. that it plans to go on strike starting Thursday morning.
The announcement comes on the heels of the union saying recommendations made by a neutral state employment board (PERB) mediator — a 6% raise over two years — were unsatisfactory. Then, on Monday, WCCUSD proposed an even smaller salary increase: 3%.
“Their offer does not provide a solution that will stabilize the staffing crisis in WCCUSD or provide the schools our students deserve,” UTR president Francisico Ortiz wrote in an email announcing the strike. “After years of sounding the alarm on the state of our schools, ten months of bargaining, PERB hearings, community action, and a District that continues to choose instability over solutions, we are left with no other option.”
The district’s latest offer was made at 3:30 p.m. on Monday — just hours after WCCUSD Superintendent Cheryl Cotton told the community in a video statement that she was “clinging to hope” that a strike could be averted, even though the union had warned that the state’s recommended raise of 6% was too low to resolve the most pressing issues: chronic teacher vacancies and the subsequent “instability students are experiencing.”
The union had asked for a 10% raise over the next two years, stating that a salary increase will help address the chronic teacher shortage in the school district. Since 2019, 200 to 300 teachers have left annually, meaning more than 1,500 teachers have left the district in five years, according to UTR data. In the beginning of this school year, there were more than 70 teacher vacancies.
In an email sent after 11 p.m. Monday night, Cotton reiterated that the district is spending more than it’s receiving in revenue and cannot afford to give the teachers more than it’s offering.
“… A strike will not fix these problems. A strike takes teachers out of classrooms, harms relationships, and can make it harder to keep strong educators. It will not improve our budget and may deepen our deficit. And it will interrupt essential services for students with special needs—students who rely on us the most,” Cotton wrote. “I understand why people are frustrated, but a strike does not solve the challenges we face and may make them harder to overcome.”
Michelle Schultz, a second-grade teacher at Hanna Ranch Elementary School in Hercules, said she is striking both as a teacher and a parent. She said her son, who attended middle school in the district, did not have a permanent teacher in four of the 18 classes he took during his time there.
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“That is almost a quarter (of his middle school classes),” Shultz told Richmondside Monday as she picked up picket signs at UTR’s office. “My son talks about how chaotic it was, how it was crowd control and just busy work.”
Schultz said she has seen a number of colleagues leave the district because they cannot afford to live and work here. But the pay increase they’re seeking is more about students than teachers, she said.
“We’re fighting for your children’s education, and we would ask that you don’t cross the picket line,” Schultz said. “If you honor the picket line, it will make this process shorter, and we can really as a community, make change for the future of our children.”
While district officials agree that teacher vacancies are a concern, they’ve also maintained that the district cannot afford the raise teachers are asking for. WCCUSD is operating with a structural deficit of $16.9 million and has to make $7.7 million in cuts this year alone.
WCCUSD officials were not immediately available for comment.
UTR said picketing will begin 45 minutes before the first bell at every school site and encourages families to join them. Union members plan to also picket after school and to hold daily rallies to “elevate student and community voices.”
Cotton said in her announcement that schools will be open, meals will be provided, and students can expect to continue to learn in a safe environment — with the caveat that the learning activities might look different from “a normal school day.”
“We will be here for every child who comes to school,” Cotton wrote, noting she is heartbroken for students. “They deserve stability, care, and a learning environment where adults work together. I believe that even in this difficult moment, we can find a better path—one built on trust, honesty, and real long-term solutions for our children.”
It is unknown how long the strike could last as there are no legal time limits. UTR officials have said they will strike as long as they need to, to negotiate what they believe is a fair contract.
“This is about our students’ futures — nothing less. Our students deserve teachers who can build relationships that last beyond a few weeks or months. They deserve schools where staff are not constantly forced to leave for other districts with better working conditions. They deserve stability — not someday, but now,” Ortiz wrote. “We will return to our classrooms the moment the District agrees to the conditions that stabilize our schools and protect the education our students deserve.”
This is WCCUSD’s first educator strike in district history, but tensions have been building for years. In 2022, UTR authorized a strike vote with 90% of those voting in favor. At the last minute, the district proposed a 14.5% raise over two years, and the strike was avoided. (The district originally proposed a 10% raise that year; the union was asking for 17%). However 40% of the members still wanted to strike, regardless of the deal.
The longest teacher strike in California history was the 1996 Oakland Unified teachers strike, which lasted 26 days. Oakland Unified teachers also went on a two-week strike in 2022.
Other WCCUSD unions consider showing support for teachers
Educators expect to be joined on the picket lines by at least one other union: the School Supervisors Association. This means different supervisors and coordinators could use their legally-protected right to support the teachers.
There’s also the Teamsters Local 856, which represents 1,500 members who perform a variety of jobs including clerical, food service, maintenance, paraprofessionals in special education and campus security. While that union reached a tentative contract agreement with the district last week, it still needs to be ratified by a majority of its members. Voting is expected to conclude on Tuesday.
The agreement secures a 3% raise for the first year of a three-year contract, with the remaining two years open to negotiations — in line with the recommendations made by the state fact-finding panel. The Teamsters were initially asking for an 8% raise over three years.
At a Teamsters meeting held Monday to review the proposed contract, the most commonly asked questions were regarding how members could still stand in solidarity with the teachers union.
Matt Finnegan, a Teamsters rep who observed the state fact-finding panel, said if the union ratifies the contract, it isn’t legally allowed to officially go on strike. However, individuals may choose to respect the picket line and forgo their pay.
“That is your decision to make,” Finnegan said. “What we would do is defend you in the case that the district disciplines you for not working during a ratified Teamster contract.”
If the union does not ratify the contract, “the only option we have would be to strike on Thursday with the teachers,” Finnegan continued.
The Teamsters union leadership said they’re recommending that members vote “yes” because they believe this is the most the district can afford to pay the union.
“When Teamsters go on strike, it’s because we feel as though there’s money being left on the table and there’s more to get. Personally, I would not sort of promote somebody going out on strike if I don’t think that we’re going to get better than what we have been offered,” said Veronica Diaz, a bargaining chair for the WCCUSD’s Teamsters. “The district has essentially turned their pockets inside out in front of a state-appointed fact finder, and this is the recommendation that that person has made.”
Diaz and Finnegan said union members can show their solidarity with teachers in other ways.
“We do not do their jobs or take on any of their duties (to show support). We walk the picket line before and after our shift, on our breaks during lunch. We help spread the message if they have flyers or other communications,” Finnegan said. “We help make sure that their strike is the most effective as it can be, so it can be the shortest possible.”
This is a developing story and we will update it as further details are available.
So we’re going back to state receivership, right? It’s been in the cards since 2019, just got delayed by all of the covid relief money that the district got. Frankly I’m not certain that receivership isn’t the best of the bad outcomes; it’s not like local control has worked out all that well for WCCUSD