It’s been nearly a month since the Clark County School District declared an impasse in negotiations with its teachers union on a new contract, sending talks to arbitration.
But don’t expect a resolution anytime soon.
State laws outline the framework for arbitration, but they don’t dictate the pace or assume that an arbitrator has immediate availability. So as it stands, contract settlement is in an in-between stage — and it is unknown when arbitration will start or end.
District spokesman Tod Story said Friday that representatives from CCSD and the Clark County Education Association had chosen an arbitrator, but the fact-finder has not yet given them dates when a hearing can begin.
Just because CCSD offered CCEA another raise proposal last week, doesn’t mean arbitration is off the table or that the impasse has been broken. That was apparent from CCEA’s dismissive reaction to the Sept. 29 offer: raises totaling 17.4% over two years using a mix of general funds and money available through Senate Bill 231, state legislation passed this year specifically to fund raises for teachers and school support professionals.
“CCEA’s focus is on the pending arbitration proceedings, not irrelevant press releases,” the union said in a statement on social media. “The proceedings have been set in motion, and we are confident that an arbitrator will render the appropriate decision on a new contract for educators.”
State law on government employee relations defines arbitration as “a process of dispute resolution where the parties involved in an impasse or grievance dispute submit their dispute to a third party for a final and binding decision.”
Before a school district and employee union can turn to an arbitrator to break up their logjam, one of the parties must formally declare an impasse. CCSD didso Sept. 12 with a one-line letter to CCEA from one of its outside attorneys retained to assist with negotiations.
“Please be advised that the Clark County School District is declaring an impasse in the negotiations for the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school year contract,” lawyer Jeffrey Mandel wrote to CCEA’s executive director.
What the law says
According to Nevada Revised Statutes 288.217, a section of state law specific to school district and educator union dispute resolution, either a district or union can declare an impasse after at least four negotiation sessions pass without an agreement. (Other state and local government employers have at least six sessions to reach an agreement before unlocking the impasse option.)
The declaration must be done in writing, which CCSD did after 11 negotiation sessions.
If the parties cannot agree to an impartial fact-finder, either may request a list of potential fact-finders from the American Arbitration Association or the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service. The parties then pick their fact-finder off the list by process of elimination, and the chosen arbitrator offers a schedule for a hearing.
The fact-finder must determine a school district’s financial ability by examining all existing and available revenues, including money appropriated by the state for salaries.
The arbitrator may pause the hearing — which is not limited to a single day — and recommend that the two sides reenter negotiations. If they reach an agreement at that time, the arbitrator can certify it.
If the renegotiations are unsuccessful, or not taken at all, each side submits a single written offer at the end of the hearings. Within 10 days, the arbitrator will choose one of the offers and issue an explanation.
Bradley Marianno, a UNLV education professor who studies teacher labor policy, said that because CCSD declared the impasse, it has the ultimate power to decide if it wants to walk back the impasse and return to the bargaining table. CCEA can propose doing so but can’t unilaterally prevent arbitration or end it on their terms.
“CCEA may not want to bring this back to the bargaining table because last time they went to arbitration they got a very favorable ruling,” he said.
CCSD’s contract with its teachers expired this summer but because it had an evergreen clause, the terms remain in effect until the next contract is settled. So, while the union and district are in arbitration, teachers remain at status quo, Marianno said.
In states that allow public employees to strike, it’s typically the case that these government employees would be barred from striking during arbitration, he said. Because teacher strikes are illegal in Nevada, there is no such provision here.
A Clark County district judge determined that teachers at several schools had taken part in a rolling strike last month when they called out sick in such high numbers over several days that eight schools were forced to close for a day at a time. The judge issued an injunction barring further sickouts and held CCEA responsible for the strike.
CCEA has denied involvement and appealed the judge’s decision to the Nevada Supreme Court, which has yet to hear the case. The sickouts largely occurred before CCSD declared the impasse.
“I don’t see CCEA doing that (striking during arbitration), because it could influence the arbitrator’s decision,” Marianno said. “They’ll want to wait to hear that out and see how that plays and then make a decision as to whether they want to risk the imposition of penalties from a judge for engaging in that illegal strike.”
Looking forward to resolution
When CCSD declared an impasse last month, its proposed package included 11% across-the-board pay raises plus as-yet unannounced SB 231 raises. It also offered $10,000 differential pay for some special education and “hard-to-fill” positions and potential upgraded placements on a proposed new pay scale.
At the time, it said CCEA’s original demands — which were for 18% across-the-board raises along with added pay for special ed and hard-to-fill positions, among other asks — were “unaffordable, budget-busting and inequitable.”
A CCEA counterproposal, which upped teachers’ base pay by 19.875% to make up for state-mandated employee increases to pension contributions, “only deepened the deficit they would impose on the district and continues to divide our hard-working teachers,” the district said.
“Because of CCEA’s inflexibility, arbitration becomes the only way to resolve the issues and pay our educators more equitably so our kids can benefit in the classroom,” the district said in its impasse announcement.
Later that week, Superintendent Jesus Jara sent a message to all teachers about the inability of the two sides to reach an agreement.
“I understand this is not the outcome many of you wanted. It wasn’t what I wanted either,” he wrote. “We remain confident that an arbitrator will see our offer as the most reasonable and beneficial option for educators.”
In a lengthy response to the impasse announcement, CCEA said the district “refused to continue bargaining.”
“CCEA has gone this route before with CCSD,” the union said in its statement, also posted to social media.
“The good thing now is a third set of eyes will see just how much more money — hundreds of millions of dollars — CCSD received from the Legislature, including the $250 million specifically allocated for educator salary increases,” CCEA added, making a reference to SB 231, which set aside the $250 million to be split among Nevada’s 17 public school districts. “It won’t be up to Jara; it won’t be up to Jara’s CFO; it won’t be up to trustees blindly following the Jara wagon.”
Been here before
While contract negotiations, which the two parties undertake every two years, are frequently lengthy and combative, the process last went to the advanced stage of arbitration in 2017. It took more than a year to get a final answer — and raises — and that was after CCSD unsuccessfully asked the Clark County District Court to set aside the arbitrator’s decision.
The arbitrated dispute was over step increases on the pay scale and a $10 million infusion into the long-troubled Teachers Health Trust, teachers’ self-funded health insurance plan. CCSD said the roughly $51 million expense would have gutted its reserves.
A year and two months elapsed from the time CCSD called an impasse to the time the District Court judge ruled that the arbitrator’s decision would stand. Arbitration itself took place over 18 hearings and conference calls scattered over eight months, according to the arbitrator’s final report.
CCSD and CCEA also faced off in arbitration in 2013 and 2012. Both situations took several months each to resolve.
In 2012, the two-part decision was split. One arbitrator allowed the district to slightly lower teacher salaries to pay for increased pension plan contributions. Another said the district had the money to give raises through pay scale step increases and for education levels. Shortly thereafter, CCSD laid off hundreds of teachers to balance its budget.
In 2013, the arbitrator ruled in CCSD’s favor when he allowed the district to freeze teacher salaries and pause paying into the health trust for retirees in exchange for bringing back the positions that had been cut the prior year.
So CCEA is aware that arbitration is not a rapid process.
It also took a spirited tone urging more rallies and to stick to only working the 7 hours and 11 minutes a day mandated in the existing contract.
“Stay tuned for more information as this continues,” the union said in a message to its rank-and-file members, “and remember: we’re in this to win.”