Sonoma Valley school board votes to settle long-simmering union labor dispute
The Sonoma Valley Unified School District Board of Trustees ended a two-year saga on Dec. 6 by accepting a settlement with the North Bay Building Construction and Trades Council and its local unions that will require the district to hire only union-affiliated workers on projects costing $212,500 or more during the next five years.
Trustees Melanie Blake, Cathy Coleman, John Kelly and Troy Knox voted in favor the settlement, while Trustee Anne Ching voted against it at a special board meeting.
“There were strong, compelling reasons to vote both ways,” President Coleman said. “Many passionate, intelligent Sonoma citizens urged us to vote ‘no,’ and I heard them. I am not in favor of the PLA (project labor agreement, also referred to as the project settlement agreement, or PSA), but this was not a new PLA: It was an encumbered settlement issue.
“I am glad that SVUSD can lay this to rest and move on to other urgent matters, including student achievement, hiring a superintendent and addressing budget matters to accommodate the recent pay increases.”
Acting Superintendent Dr. Elizabeth Kaufman said that the board deliberated on the labor agreement with the council individually and collectively.
“This board prioritized its responsibility for making an informed decision on this issue prior to a board transition in which new members, with less familiarity on the issue, would be asked to make a decision,” she said. “The purpose of the settlement was to resolve disputes and avoid litigation.”
Kelly said that the settlement will provide jobs and prioritize a locally based, skilled and trained workforce as well as joint apprenticeship opportunities for Sonoma Valley students.
“These joint apprenticeship opportunities will afford students access to career pathway options that will provide families with supporting wages, health care and retirement benefits, and the ability to live and work in their own community,” he said after the meeting.
Ching had been elected to the board, but was not yet serving on it, when the original PLA for the project was approved on Nov. 17, 2020.
“I did not support the PLA because I didn’t see how it ultimately served our students, teachers and community,” she said after the meeting. “I inherited an agreement that I believed was disadvantageous to the district, and the new board never had an opportunity to evaluate it on its own merits. At the very least, if I had the opportunity to negotiate a contract from scratch, I would have argued for provisions that would have included a core employee workforce and preference for local hires. The contract put in front of the board does not contain any of these provisions.”
Ching said that the vast majority of the $120 million the district received in bonds from Measure E, passed by voters in November 2016, has been spent, but incomplete and future projects are now subject to PLA requirements.
“One of my greatest concerns that I tried to convey is that the passage of a PLA greatly diminishes the ability of the district to pass future general obligation bonds for school renovations and upgrades,” she said. “This is a real risk. Many constituents and taxpayers who reached out to me believe that the board has betrayed their trust by imposing labor restrictions on Measure E bond funds, which were not disclosed at the time the referendum was presented to voters in 2016.”
She said that many community members would not have voted for the measure if they had known that the funds were subject to a PLA.
“By approving this (settlement), we might jeopardize the opportunity to have successful future bond measures,” she said.
What the settlement contains
The original PLA for the project, approved by the board on Nov. 17, 2020, called for a 10-year contract and mandated that the district hire only union-affiliated workers on projects costing $50,000 or more. The board voted to rescind the PLA on May 18, 2021, prompting the NBBCTC to file a lawsuit on July 9, 2021, seeking a court order to force the district to comply with the agreement.
Michael Allen, a former California state assemblyman and representative of the NBBCTC, then reached out to the district to see if a compromise could be reached. This led to a settlement proposal that the board approved on Dec. 6.
Under the settlement, all employees of contractors and subcontractors will be required to register with the appropriate trade union for the next five years. They will not be required to join the union, but must comply with the union security provision of the applicable collective bargaining agreement.
At Blake’s request, legal counsel Glenn Gould presented a summary of his assessment, including pros and cons of the settlement, in open session before the board voted.
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