November 15, 2024
Dear Classified Staff, Teachers, Parents, and Community Members:
We received Tillamook School District’s latest offer during the evening of November 12th with an expiration date of November 15, 2024, at 7:14pm. At the time of writing this update, the offer is not published on the District’s website, but we’ve uploaded the one page document here for you to view. In short, this is the substance of their offer:
What the District accepts:
● District accepts an editorial change to bereavement leave which provides the bare legal minimum.
● District accepts OSEA’s one adjustment to who is eligible to be on the committee determined in TSD9’s own October 26 Special Education MemorandumofAgreement (MOA), and therefore agrees to continue bargaining impacts from Senate Bill (SB) 756.
What we accept:
● We lose the conversion of the personal leave bank to a sick leave bank. Instead of allowing members to donate their sick leave to colleagues in need, they must donate their very limited personal leave.
● We lose guaranteed vacation rollover. Staff who do not use their vacation, likely because of low staffing due to the classified sub shortage or commitment to our student’s education, will forfeit their vacation leave. We proposed just five days of rollover.
The worst part? In previous proposals, the District agreed to the sick leave bank and twenty five vacation rollover days. In their July 8 proposal, the District agreed to rollover twenty five vacation days, and now can’t accept five rollover days. In their July 9 proposal, the District agreed to convert the personal leave bank to a sick leave bank. We continue to be disappointed by these regressive positions from the District and call on them to stop playing hardball games and settle this contract by accepting our fair proposals.
The District is imposing short expirations on their offers to bully our team into making decisions. Worse yet, they are withholding their proposals on other open articles, including Just Cause and Vacancies, pending our approval of this offer. Similar to the regressions mentioned above, the District had already noted that our Vacancies article could be agreeable, as documented and highlighted in the District’s own notes.
These tactics are exactly why we filed for mediation. The constant delaying behavior, bad faith negotiation practices, and direct dealing with members have already forced OSEA to file an unfair labor practice (ULP) charge against the District. Despite what you may have heard from District representatives, the District’s legal counsel agreed to October 17 as a mediation date in correspondence including Superintendent Ellis, as shared in our second ULP filing but reduced to the relevant correspondence here. That’s right, not one but two ULP charges. If the information doesn’t come from OSEA, throw it away!
We remain committed to securing a fair contract and are rejecting the District’s latest proposal because we know they can do better- even their proposals and notes indicate they can do better. Join us in telling the District that they can do better by sending a letter demanding them to settle the contract by clicking here or visiting bit.ly/TSDletter
In Unity,
OSEA Tillamook Chapter 28 Bargaining Team
