By LESTER CHANG
The Fremont Education Association Sept. 3 forcefully requested that trustees end an impasse in the eight-month-old contract dispute and resume efforts to forge a new contract.
The request, made at the last Fremont Union High School District board meeting, comes nearly two weeks after trustees initiated the impasse after negotiators failed to agree on such key issues as salaries and health benefits.
The union, with nearly 400 members, subsequently agreed to the impasse, which was officially declared Aug. 21. The union now feels it can work out a settlement without the help of a mediator, said FEA President George Gredassoff.
The mediator, to come from the California State Conciliation board because of the impasse, would not know enough about the issues to help resolve the dispute, he insisted.
"What makes you think an outsider can do better?" he asked the board. Because the FEA request was not on the agenda, the board couldn't respond.
It is not known if the mediator will still be brought in, but if that individual isn't able to make progress in the talks, a three-person panel will take up the matter and gather facts in the dispute.
If both sides still can't reach an agreement, a strike could be called.
Gredassoff said the board acted prematurely in declaring an impasse and should have seriously weighed the FEA's latest proposal.
That included a 12.3 percent salary increase, a one-year contract, full health benefits and better retirement benefits.
The district proposes a 6.38 percent salary boast, a three-year contract, a health benefit program in which teachers can select services and save money, and a ceiling on retirement benefits.
District officials maintain that their proposal would help the district remain financially solvent.
Gredassoff said the district has insulted the union by proposing to give teachers less than what was offered to other employees .
Gredassoff also said that the stalled negotiations could disrupt school activities, perhaps preventing teachers from writing letters of recommendation for college-students, or volunteering for after-school programs, for instance.
But the district has warned the FEA not to encourage its teachers to engage in such activities.
The district has noted that teachers are contractually required to write the letters of recommendation, to tutor and to make it to class before the start of a school day with a lesson plan. The FEA said its teachers aren't required by the contract to do so.
Both sides have squabbled over how much reserve funds exist to cover the contract proposals. Refuting claims by the the FEA that $9 million or so exists, Mike Raffetto, who heads the business division in the district, presented statistics that only $6.8 million exists.
Of that amount, the district has set aside $1.3 million for its proposed 6.38 percent salary increases for teachers and their health benefits for one year.
Another $700,000 was used to cover salary increases for classified, management and supervisory personnel, he said.
The remaining $4.8 million of the $6.8 million will be used to cover future contractual increases for all district employees and other district expenses, he added.
Dipping into the remaining $4.8 million would result in quicker use of the reserves and could push the district closer to fiscal instability, Raffetto said.
Board member Andrew Springmeyer said the statistics from the district financial reports for the 1995-96 school year were unclear.
He said the district accrued funds during lean budget years, yet the funds seem to have dwindled now, when the economy is on the rebound.
Because he found the statistics unclear, Springmeyer abstained from voting on the approval of financial reports presented at the meeting. The other four board members approved them.
After the meeting, Raffetto said the district made significant expenditure cuts during lean budget years. For the 1994-95 school year, for instance, the district cut nearly $400,000 in expenditures for district office operations and employees, equipment, supplies and other materials, district reports showed.
For 30 minutes before the board meeting, more than 100 teachers and supporters picketed the district's administration building on West Fremont Avenue.
Teachers plan to picket indefinitely at the five high schools every Tuesday, FEA officials said.
Springmeyer said he supported the effort by the teachers, adding he felt bad because the teachers "started the new year without a new contract."
The current contract expired last month and will remain in effect until a new one is approved.
This article appeared in the Sunnyvale Sun, September 11, 1996.
©1996 Metro Publishing, Inc. All rights reserved.