Santa Barbara Unified, California School Employees Association Agree to Wage Increases

Latest Round of Negotiations Lead to More Tentative Agreements Between District and Its Classified Employees

During the last SBUSD school board meeting, lead family engagement liaison Peggy Ochoa said that it was difficult to survive on only 50 percent of her pay as a district office employee, so she “could not image” the challenges faced by lower-paid classified employees. | Credit: Courtesy

More tentative agreements were recently reached between the Santa Barbara Unified School District and the California School Employees Association (CSEA), including increases in wages during a time when layoffs loom on the horizon.

That includes increased hourly compensation for classified employees — such as custodians and family engagement liaisons — with raises of $0.30 to $1.55 for the lowest salary ranges. For instance, employees hired at $16.01/hour will instead be hired at $17.56/hour, and employees hired at $18.07/hour will instead receive $18.37/hour.

According to the district’s negotiations update, the agreement was spurred by a “mutual interest” in having the lowest earners start closer to $20/hour, with the knowledge that further negotiations will continue to increase wages.

The goal, it says, is to be more competitive with the state minimum wage of $16/hour and recent state legislation that calls for fast food employees to receive a minimum wage of $20/hour.

All in all, these compensation proposals will add around $254,000 in ongoing costs to the district’s budget.

Additionally, as the district considers layoffs triggered by the expiration of one-time COVID-era funds, ongoing labor negotiations will most likely affect how the cuts play out.

In response to a question about how wage agreements may impact layoffs and vice versa, district spokesperson Ed Zuchelli said factors such as the development of the new three-year Local Control Accountability Plan, the governor’s proposed budget, declining enrollment, and uncertainty around the final cost of labor negotiation proposals “has and will impact the budgeting process for next school year.”

However, it seems that the specific impacts, particularly on staff, remain to be seen.

In addition to the tentative agreement on hourly compensation, the two parties agreed on a “Me Too” compensation clause, which would guarantee that any wage increases applied to other employees (e.g. teachers) would also be implemented with CSEA.

Other updates to negotiations can be viewed on the district’s website here.