Guest columnist
Make boards, teachers negotiate contracts in public

By Glenn Anderson
Special to The Times

	Glenn Anderson
	E-mail this article Print this article Search archive

For parents, students and taxpayers who have experienced the fallout of recent teacher strikes in Issaquah and Marysville, it is an education in the complex world of labor tactics, bureaucracy and politics.

Having watched each of these disputes unfold, I've witnessed a critical phenomenon that contributes to the divisiveness and duration of these drawn-out disputes: a very high degree of misinformation, leading to public mistrust and confusion about local school-funding decisions.

K-12 education is singled out in Washington's constitution as the state's "paramount" duty. It is the instrument by which we advance equal opportunity for all. It is the central purpose of local school boards to serve our families, communities and consequently our state by providing our children with a basic education. These strikes subvert that premise.

	JIMI LOTT / THE SEATTLE TIMES Former teacher Mike Colacarro shows his support for striking Marysville teachers.

As parents, teachers, citizens and leaders, it's our obligation to earnestly investigate and understand the issues that lead to these community-crippling disputes so that we can prevent them from happening again.

If we can agree on that goal, then we can agree on this: A solution to bring more transparency to teacher contract negotiations can be achieved by making them subject to the provisions of the state Open Meetings Act.

Let's remove school board politics and Hoffa-style labor tactics from the education process and put parents, students and taxpayers as observers in the room with the school board and the teachers' union. The only way to avoid the spin wars and campaigns of misinformation is to force everyone to lay their cards on the table and subject both parties to the bright light of public scrutiny.

It may not be the most comfortable approach for negotiators, but as we've learned from these two strikes, it's not about the negotiators. Parents and taxpayers deserve better than a process aimed at extorting concessions by holding children hostage.

It has been suggested that "binding arbitration" is the answer.

After all, what could be more fair than an independent negotiator settling differences between school districts and the teacher's union? The problem with that approach is threefold.

First, it tends to force both sides to more extreme positions, on the assumption that the arbiter will ultimately split the difference. We want a process that brings both sides together — not one that polarizes. The merits of any solution should be based on its capacity to resolve contract talks without work stoppages.

Binding arbitration forces negotiators to dig in their heels, in which case the arbiter either splits the differences, or chooses the last and best final offer of one of the parties in a winner-take-all decree. Neither outcome assures the best interests of the children and parents of the community are met. In fact, we've seen how binding arbitration fails to produce the desired results in the unsuccessful application of this approach in Pennsylvania, California and Michigan.

Second, the decision of the arbiter will likely bear little relationship to the school districts' and taxpayers' capacity or legal authority to pay for the outcome. Arbiters would be forced to settle differences between teachers and school boards on collective-bargaining issues without weighing the impact on student programs and classroom needs that might have to be cut as a result. This places enormous power in the hands of an unelected select few and effectively makes elected school boards irrelevant.

Finally, binding arbitration still leaves the most important players — parents, students and taxpayers — on the sidelines and in the dark. Teacher strikes are unique in that they place the greatest hardship not on teachers and board members, but on the families and taxpayers who are not welcome at the negotiating table, but are liable for the tax bill, lost wages and additional expenses, and damage to their children's future.

Opening school district labor negotiations to the public preserves the fundamentals of the collective-bargaining process while not picking up the liabilities of the binding-arbitration process.

Just imagine. Districts would have to put forward the most reasonable budget and compensation proposal possible, and justify priorities between program funding and compensation. Teacher's unions would have to do the same. Neither could avoid looking the public square in the eye. It would eliminate the incentives for misinformation and the counterproductive propaganda broadsides that ensue outside the negotiating room in the public-relations war to capture the support of parents.

Effectively addressing the important issues facing schools in every community requires us to draw back the veil of secrecy around these negotiations and to allow parents the opportunity to insist that administrators and teachers do the job we pay them to do — educate our children.

Rep. Glenn Anderson, R-Fall City, is the House Republican floor leader and represents the 5th Legislative District, which includes the Issaquah School District.

Copyright © 2003 The Seattle Times Company