By Caroline Bermudez

Nearly two years ago, Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez posed a question in an op-ed worth revisiting.

“Is the L.A. teachers union tone deaf?”

Based on a recent speech given by Alex Caputo-Pearl, the head of United Teachers Los Angeles, the answer is a definitive yes.

The juvenile world of heroes and villains Caputo-Pearl described, one where evil corporations and billionaires look to profit from public education while scrappy, earnest underdogs try to stop them, bears no semblance to reality.

Teachers unions in California comprise one of the most powerful political forces in the state.

Rather than admit this, Caputo-Pearl issued a battle cry worthy of a Bugs Bunny cartoon in his speech given at the UTLA Leadership Conference:

“With our contract expiring in June 2017, the likely attack on our health benefits in the fall of 2017, the race for Governor heating up in 2018, and the unequivocal need for state legislation that addresses inadequate funding and increased regulation of charters, with all of these things, the next year-and-a-half must be founded upon building our capacity to strike, and our capacity to create a state crisis, in early 2018. There simply may be no other way to protect our health benefits and to shock the system into investing in the civic institution of public education.”

What is glaring in Caputo-Pearl’s speech is that aside from mentioning his own two children, the word “children” was said only once. This speaks volumes as to the rationale behind his leadership, a role serving the interests of adults before those of students. Threatening to strike should be an absolute last resort, not the first order of action.

It calls to mind a classic paradox.

Unstoppable force, meet immovable object.

The unstoppable force is the rising cost of health care and pensions in this nation. As a result of these sharply increasing costs, LAUSD faces a staggering amount of debt, to the tune of more than $11 billion, that threatens to cripple the entire system because the district is on the hook, per demands made by UTLA, to provide lifetime health benefits and retirement pensions to its employees.

According to a report written by an independent financial review panel that was commissioned by LAUSD, the district owes more than $20,000 per student for unfunded liabilities (see page 44) although per pupil expenditure in California is less than $10,000 per student. Placed in further context, the liability for retirement benefits LAUSD is obligated to pay for is four times that of other large urban school districts. Twenty-seven percent of state funding LAUSD receives goes to paying pension and health care costs before factoring in teacher salaries, school supplies and textbooks.

To fully fund health care benefits, LAUSD would have to pay $868 million every year for 30 years—and it is not alone. Seventy percent of school districts in California provide some variety of lifetime health benefits to retired employees.

The pain will not be felt by Los Angeles alone.

The immovable object is the UTLA, which Lopez wrote, “has shown little flexibility: not on salary negotiations, tenure, student testing, teacher evaluations or anything else.” The district is standing on the edge of a fiscal cliff, yet Caputo-Pearl ignored the findings of the report.

• Enrollment at LAUSD schools has declined by 100,000 students, half of the loss is due to a dip in the birth rate and students transferring to other school districts. The other half has gone to charter schools, but the report’s authors take a neutral stance when it comes to charter schools. They advised the district to study why families decamped for these schools in the hopes of gathering insight.

• Although enrollment has dropped dramatically, the number of full-time staff at LAUSD increased, which the report’s authors wrote merited rethinking.

• Students in the district attend school less often than the statewide average resulting in daily losses of revenue.

• Only 75 percent of LAUSD teachers have a strong attendance rate (defined as attending work at least 96 percent of the time), leading the district to spend $15 million it can ill afford to lose paying for substitute teachers.

These findings paint a more complicated picture than Caputo-Pearl was willing to acknowledge. Instead, he resorted to megalomania. He stated, “We are going to need to build as much power as possible to shift the political dynamics not just in Los Angeles, but in California.”

Except teachers unions have already done just that and have been for years. A Los Angeles Times article stated the California Teachers Association, which UTLA is a part of, is one of the biggest political players in the state with the money to back it up:

“It outpaced all other special interests, including corporate players such as telecommunications giant AT&T and the Chevron oil company, from 2000 through 2009, according to a state study. In that decade, the labor group shelled out more than $211 million in political contributions and lobbying expenses — roughly twice that of the next largest spender, the Service Employees International Union.

“Since then it has spent nearly $40 million more, including $4.7 million to help Brown become governor, according to the union’s filings with the secretary of state.”

We are not talking about some cash-strapped upstart, but a well-oiled political machine, a group that will fight tooth and nail to preserve its own interests even if it means bringing about financial ruin.

Caputo-Pearl should not aim to create a state crisis, but to try to prevent one from happening. But when someone delivers a speech about education and the word “children” is barely uttered, holding such a hope is magical thinking. If UTLA doesn’t embrace some measure of compromise with the district, the immovable object will have nothing to meet it.

Caroline Bermudez is a senior writer at Education Post and former reporter at Chronicle of Philanthropy.

As LA Unified deals with looming deficits that could reach $600 million, a recent independent Financial Report attributes a large share of it to the ever-increasing costs of health benefits for present and retired employees.

The district spends 14 percent of its budget on active and retired employee health benefits — which is more than it spends on instructional books and supplies. It is also more than the entire budget of existing classified employee salaries, which are jobs in the district that don’t require teaching credentials.

In a report for the Budget, Facilities and Audit Committee recently, the district’s Benefits Administration director, Janice Sawyer, said that the district offers a relatively generous health benefits package.

“We want to retain talent in the district; that’s why we have those health benefits,” said Sawyer. But, she notes that the population of retirees is growing, compared with the active employee base, and the district is not putting any money aside to pay for those promised benefits.

To fund retiree obligations, the district would have to sock away $868 million a year, Sawyer said.

Meanwhile, the district is making it tougher to be eligible for lifetime medical benefits. Anyone hired before 1984 needs to work only five years before retiring to get fully-paid individual and family medical benefits. Today, district employees have to work 25 consecutive years before retiring, and the age at retirement added to the number of service years must reach at least 85.

“It seems like we’re making it harder and harder for people to be eligible, and maybe we should just say we’re not going to do it anymore,” said board member Mónica Ratliff, chair of the budget committee. “We’re making people jump through hoops.”

Board member Richard Vladovic said it was important to honor the promise made to retirees, but “the promise wasn’t made to new employees, and we have to ensure the solvency of the district.”

Ratliff added, “I wonder if we don’t have the money in the long run if it comes to a point that we stop making the promise.”

In California, only one other school district — San Diego — pays full health care for active employees and their dependents. Long Beach school district pays full benefits for employees only, not families, and most of the other districts pay partial insurance benefits and don’t pay any health benefits after retirement.

LA Unified has 225,000 employees, and gets about 68,000 calls a year for questions about benefits, Sawyer said. She said the district is known for its generous health benefits program since the 1940s and it has tried to control the costs of those benefits since the 1960s.

In some parts of the report, Ratliff also noted serious problems when one type of employee could be working the same 7 1/2-day and be eligible for benefits while another would not.

“That seems like it would call for a lot of unhappiness and unfairness in equity,” said Ratliff. The staff said the unions are working to fix that with the district’s Health Benefits Committee.

Ratliff also wondered why teacher assistants are only eligible for half benefits.  “How are they doing that if they have kids?” she asked.

Ratliff said her priority as a board member is to figure out how to keep the district from going bankrupt. The district has eight unions with a benefits program that includes life insurance, medical, dental and vision — while working and after retirement.

But, it’s not all perfect. Vladovic, who is covered by the district’s health care as a retired employee, said the dental benefits are not as good as they could be.

“All you need is one root canal and there goes your benefits for the entire year,” he said.

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Max Arias of SEIU Local 99

The union representing school support personnel is pressing LAUSD to provide the same health benefits for all its members, fearing that the district wants to create a second-class level of employees.

Among the 35,000 members of Service Employees International Union Local 99 (SEIU) are about 7,000 who work as teacher aides, community representatives, after-school coaches and out-of-school program workers. These employees do not have access to LA Unified’s health plan because it is either too expensive, or they are not eligible.

“Some of our workers could be eligible for health care if they work one more hour, and others can’t afford the insurance offered with the 50 percent co-pay,” SEIU Local 99 executive director Max Arias told LA School Report. “We want all these people to get access to health care.”

The issue arose in June with an SEIU proposal to cover the workers; SEIU was expecting a counter-proposal. Instead, the district offered possible suggestions for the workers in the job categories in question, known as F and G units, that could include a new high-deductible plan, reduced benefits for new employees, no coverage for dependents and a cut in retirement benefits.

The teachers union, UTLA, has also expressed concerns about possible cuts in health benefits by the district. The district said no decisions have been made.

“We are worried that the options they are coming up with are even more extreme,” Arias said. “Sometimes, the only person who asks a child, ‘Did you do your homework today?’ is a bus driver or TA or one of our workers. We want the district to come up with a counter proposal and come back to the table again.”

Bargaining team member Andrea Weathersby, who works as a teacher assistant at Purche Elementary School, said that the district was unprepared at their meeting to respond.

“I believe four months is sufficient amount of time to look at our proposal and come up with some alternatives if they did not agree,” she said. “But to not even take the time to make a counter proposal means they are not taking us seriously. It seems that the district doesn’t want all employees to have healthcare.”

A district spokesman said no decisions have been made that would resolve the negotiations.

SEIU leaders said they want to avoid creating a second-class level of employees with lower benefits. They are urging their members to attend the next school board meeting on Oct. 13

“It is not a protest. We need to give the school board information and tell our stories, because we know some of the school board members support us,” Arias said. “We do not want to create an action that will make them uncomfortable.”

As one example, he cited a 70-year-old part-time worker who isn’t eligible for health care. “These are dedicated employees, and the school board needs to hear their stories so they can explain it to the public,” Arias said.

The union is also collecting cards and petition signatures online. So far, no more negotiation sessions are scheduled, but Arias said, “We can and will mobilize if we have to.”

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UTLA rally at James Monroe High School Nov. 20, 2014

When LA Unified and its teachers union agreed to new three-year deals on a contract and health benefits this spring, one strike was averted. But another may be on the horizon.

UTLA President Alex Caputo-Pearl took the stage over the weekend at the union’s annual leadership conference and made another strike threat in his State of the Union address, predicting that the district would try to rollback health benefits when they reopen negotiations in 2017.

While it may appear that Caputo-Pearl just likes saying “strike,” he doesn’t have to squint too hard to see the writing on the wall: several district leaders have said LA Unified will need to rethink its health benefits next time around.

The current health benefits contract was given a thumbs up by Superintendent Ramon Cortines and was approved by the school board with a 6-1 vote in April. But in its press release announcing the deal, the district pointed out the rising costs of health care for employers. The deal will cost the district over $3 billion dollars over three years, with each succeeding year costing roughly five to six percent more.

In the release, Cortines said, “I want to be clear: this agreement is not a final solution, and I agree that drastic changes need to be made if we are to sustain health benefits and honor our commitment to our employees and retirees.”

In response to Caputo-Pearl’s prediction, district spokeswoman Shannon Haber told LA School Report, “We can’t speculate what the financial condition of the state, and consequently the district, will be two years from now. However, the district is always seeking ways to reduce the cost of health benefits — without reducing the level of service —  to our employees.”

The benefits package LA Unified offers is among the most robust of any district in the state for including free lifetime benefits for retirees and their dependents. It is one of about 70 districts in California that provides lifetime benefits with no premiums. Most other plans in the state only offer benefits until the retiree turns 65 and becomes eligible for Medicare.

Continuing to offer the current lifetime benefits will cost the district $868 million annually for 30 years, the Los Angeles Times reported in March.

“It’s scary,” Megan Reilly, LA Unified’s chief financial officer, told the Times. “It has been a growing concern that our liabilities have been increasing year after year and slowly becoming larger than our assets. We’re not there yet, but we probably have a couple of years to go.”

School Board Member, Tamar Galatzan

School board member Tamar Galatzan (pictured) is quite possibly the busiest elected official in the city. One of two board members who has chosen to serve part-time (along with Nury Martinez), Galatzan also has a full-time job at the City Attorney’s office, and is the mother of two boys in elementary school. (She’s the only board member with a child currently in LAUSD.)

Galatzan, who represents much of the San Fernando valley, typically votes with the Monica Garcia voting bloc, and, as chair of the Budget Committee, she has also been something of a fiscal watchdog.

Recently interviewed in a San Fernando Valley field office located on the grounds of her Birmingham High School alma mater, Galatzan spoke about school board dynamics, her hopes for the most recent labor contract, and Superintendent John Deasy’s performance during a budget crisis.

LA School Report: You have another job with the city attorney’s office. What is the other job?

Tamar Galatzan: I’m a deputy city attorney. The unit I’m assigned to is the neighborhood prosecutor program. I work out of three LAPD divisions and I work on quality of life problems in the community. So things involving squatters and hoarders and transients and mobile billboards and party houses and nuisance properties.

LASR: Why do you do both jobs?

TG: Because it matters. I wouldn’t do either job unless I felt passionately about it. But it’s a lot of stuff to juggle. Plus two little boys.

LASR: So you chose to do the school board part-time because you already had the job at the city attorney’s office?

TG: Because I can’t live and pay a mortgage on $40,000 [note: the actual salary for a full-time board member is $45,000].

LASR: You recently told LA Magazine that the job is the “worst of both worlds.” (see: The Takeover Artist) Do you remember this quote? What did you mean by that?

TG: In some respects, being on the [LAUSD] school board is like being on the board of directors of a company like Chevron or Bank of America, where you don’t have a lot of control over the day-to-day operations and you’re really there to set policy, hire the CEO, and everything else that goes on at the company is the responsibility of someone else.

The reason why it’s frustrating is that our constituents hold us responsible for issues over which we have no control. I am not the person who makes the decision over changing the attendance boundary of a school. I don’t select principals. We don’t do much about curriculum. The school board doesn’t have any control over that. You can yell at me and vote me out of office or whatever you want to do, but I still don’t have any control over that.

LASR: What would your proposal be, if you were re-writing the charter [governing LAUSD]?

TG: I would probably go more towards some sort of [mayor-] appointed board.

LASR: You’ve worked with three superintendents. Compare superintendent Deasy to the last couple.

TG: I’m not going there. I personally just don’t believe in doing performance evaluations via the media. I think that one of the things that has faced, especially Cortines and Deasy, [is that] they’ve had to lurch from crisis to crisis, namely about the budget but about Miramonte and about everything else that keeps happening. But when you look at it, we’ve made devastating budget cuts, and test scores are up. Our graduation rate is up. Enrollment is up. These are all things you wouldn’t expect with the kinds of cuts we’ve had to make. And I think a lot of that has been because of the leadership of both Ray Cortines and John Deasy.

LASR: The school board is supposed to decide which charter schools get renewed. But school board members can also take political contributions. Is that a conflict of interest?

TG: School board members also ratify all the agreements with the employee unions, and they take contributions from them as well.

LASR: So are they both conflicts of interest?

TG: It’s an interesting question, because when you get down to it, who cares who’s on the school board? The only people who really care are the unions, because these people are going to be voting on their contracts. And maybe a charter might care because they’re going to be voting on their charter. But who else cares? Everyday parents, as you can see from the incredibly low voter turnout, don’t really care who’s on the school board.

If UTLA does an [independent expenditure campaign] on your behalf, does that mean you shouldn’t vote on anything that impacts teachers? I don’t know. I’m certainly not against exploring limiting who can make contributions. It’s a great topic for debate. I just don’t know who would be left to make a contribution.

LASR: I’ve been to a number of school board meetings. It’s obvious that there are these factions, these voting cliques, on the board. That’s how it seems to me. Is that uncomfortable?

TG: Depends on your tolerance for acrimonious debate. I’m a prosecutor, I’m used to people disagreeing with me. We have a vigorous debate, and we move on.

LASR: So it’s not personal?

TG: I didn’t say that. I think there are people… how should I put this? I don’t think the board right now is… I think it can be dysfunctional at times.

LASR: Dysfunctional in its public discourse, or in the decisions it makes?

TG: Keep going.

LASR: So both?

TG: Yeah. I think people, especially in public office, should be able to disagree without being disagreeable. And I think that dynamic, unfortunately, doesn’t carry over to the whole board. If you disagree with someone on a policy issue, then that’s some sort of personal affront to them. And I think that’s too bad.

LASR: You’ve been on the school board since 2007. Is there a decision that the board has made in that time that you’re most proud of?

TG: We negotiated a contract with UTLA that would give schools charter-like freedoms, to be able to innovate without leaving to become a charter school. And we’re gonna really see the first round of those this year. I think that could have a huge impact, and that’s something that I certainly pushed for. I don’t know how much you know about my district, but it’s different than the rest of LAUSD.

LASR: How so?

TG: I represent almost half of the San Fernando Valley, and a huge percentage of middle-class schools that don’t qualify for Title I anti-poverty dollars [money from the federal government]. These are your typical middle class schools. They’re some of the highest performing schools in the district. Budget cuts have had a disproportionate impact on them, and a lot of the schools are becoming affiliated charters in order to get access to additional funds.

LAUSD spends a lot of time, for good reason, focusing on schools that are struggling, and students who are underachieving. But those schools that are doing pretty well, no one pays attention to them, and they are desperately short of resources.

I mean, everyone holds up their test scores and says how wonderful they are, but when you realize they don’t have money for Xerox paper, that’s a problem. If we want to keep middle class families in the school district, we need to pay more attention to those schools.

LASR: Is there any decision that the school board has taken in the last 5 years that you wish you could reverse its vote?

TG: Oh my goodness, where do I start?

My first big vote on the school board was a very controversial one, and I was one of two votes, along with Marlene Canter, against extending health benefits to part-time cafeteria workers. I got a lot of flack and still do. But I felt that this issue should have been bargained at the bargaining table. Just like I said yesterday at a board meeting, about Mr. Zimmer’s resolution about Academic Growth Over Time, there are issues that are supposed to be bargained, and the board shouldn’t intervene and make a political decision to favor one side or the other in the middle of negotiations.

And I felt that we couldn’t afford those benefits. If they were bargained, then there would be a give and a take. And if that were something the health benefits committee valued, then they would have to help us figure out a way to pay for it.

LASR: And they’re incredible health plans, right?

TG: They’re very comprehensive health plans. And it’s cost us, in the middle of a budget crisis a lot of money.

LASR: All the money that LAUSD spends on health benefits, it’s something like $800 million?

TG: That’s probably low. But yeah, it’s close to $1 billion.

LASR: One last question. You’ve run for city council before. Any plans to run for something else?

TG: Uh…. I have no plans right now to run for everything. I have a very full life with LAUSD and the city attorney’s office and being a mom to two very active boys.

LASR: You know it’s a law that journalists have to ask that question at the end of an interview.

TG: Do you ever get someone saying, “Why yes”?

LASR: Not really.