STRIKE VOTE: Kent teachers defy judge’s order; vote to continue strike

The Kent teachers union voted Monday to defy a judge’s orders to head back to their classrooms this week. Instead, members of the Kent Education Association will continue to strike. At least one major picket line was due to get under way starting 5 a.m. Tuesday at Kentridge High School.

Union members voted 74 percent in favor of ignoring King County Superior Court Judge Andrea Jarvas’ order to go back to the classroom Tuesday.

“Our members have decided what we are doing is right,” said KEA President Lisa Brackin Johnson after the vote at Green River College in Auburn.

Noting one of the union’s main sticking points, she added, “we are asking for smaller classes and class size is the big issue.”

As of press deadline Monday evening, it was unclear as to what the penalties would be.

Jarvas’ ruling last week was in favor of the Kent School District, which had requested an injunction against KEA’s strike.

“The strike by the Kent Education Association is illegal,” Jarvas wrote in her decision, which she announced at the Norm Maleng Regional Justice Center in Kent.

When asked Monday night if she was prepared to go to jail for defying Jarvas’ decision, Brackin Johnson didn’t mince words.

“If that is what the judge rules, then that is what I will do,” she said.

Brackin Johnson said the KEA negotiating team was ready and prepared to continued negotiations with district officials.

“The bargaining team will return tonight to the negotiations,” she said.

It wasn’t clear if the district’s negotiating team would be there.

Teachers departing Monday’s meeting, where approximately 1,300 took the vote, said their decision to continue the strike wasn’t one they took lightly.

“It was a hard decision. It took a lot of debate,” said Meeker Middle School teacher Ron Colston, who has been teaching in Kent for 29 years.

“We had to go with what we feel was right.”

Negotiations between the Kent School District and the Kent Education Association had gone on throughout the weekend and through Labor Day in an attempt to reach an agreement before Monday’s meeting.

But spokespeople for both sides said Monday morning the union and district were still far apart on many of the issues, including class-size language.

“We have been negotiating since April … and we still are not close to having and entire contract agreement to take to our membership,” KEA spokesman Dale Folkerts said Monday morning. “We’d like to bring an agreement to our members to vote on.”

Much of the work over the weekend, which included a session of more than 12 hours on Sunday, focused on the issue of meetings. A second mediator was also sent by the state Public Employment Relations Commission to help in negotiations.

The two sides also have exchanged new class-size issues, though Folkerts said the union team was expecting a new proposal and/or response to a union proposal by 11 a.m. Monday, but Folkerts said as of 11:45 a.m. no proposal had been received.

District spokeswoman Becky Hanks said district negotiators delivered a class-size proposal to the mediator by 11 a.m. Monday.

“Our hope is the hard work this weekend regarding meetings, class size and compensation will result in sufficient reason for a tentative agreement and we can move forward together,” Hanks said Monday.

Folkerts said it would be possible to take a partial agreement to members to vote on, but “to make that work you have to have a trust agreement with the bargaining team on the other side.”

“At this point we are still trying to build that level of trust,” Folkerts said.

King County Superior Court Judge Andrea Darvas this past week ruled the strike by the KEA was illegal and ordered the teachers back to work beginning Tuesday with school set to begin Wednesday.

Following a member meeting Thursday, however, teachers seemed more than willing to defy the judge’s order, even if it meant a contempt citation. Folkerts said it was hard to find teachers “not willing to take a stand” on issues they believe important.

“The indication on Thursday was they remain pretty committed to standing up for these issues,” Folkerts said. “It will up to KEA members to decide their next step.”

Folkerts said parents also have made clear to the union that while they want them to return to the classroom, they want them to do so under contract, not a court order.

Hanks said the district was not ready to comment on what their next move would be if the teachers do not return to work Tuesday morning.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it,” she said.

Folkerts, who has been involved in teacher strikes in the past, including the Bellevue strike in 2008, said there were similarities and differences between the strikes.

Folkerts said every district in Washington faces the same issues on state funding, adequate resources in the classroom and adequate pay for teachers.

“The similarities between Kent and other strikes is that the strike erupts when those issues can’t be resolved within a reasonable and collaborative manner with district administration,” Folkerts said, adding that many districts find “creative solutions” to the issues.

Folkerts said teachers in Kent feel there is a “culture of blame and intimidation,” highlighted by the district decision to seek an injunction so early in the strike.

“That culture did not spring up overnight,” he said, adding that it has been “daily life in Kent classrooms for a number of years.”

The district said it went to court to get kids back in school as soon as possible, as well to make sure the 1,100 non-teaching employees of the district get back to work because those workers do not get paid and do not have benefits while school is not in session.

Hanks also said the district has been bargaining in good faith and would continue to do so.

“We have been and will continue to work in the spirit of collaboration with the teachers’ union,” Hanks said.

Check www.kentreporter.com for updates, including the results of Monday’s KEA member meeting.

Brian Beckley, Laura Pierce and Dennis Box contributed to this report.