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City, LA Unified join forces for one-stop family needs centers*
Once upon a time people turned to local parishes in times of need, whether they needed help for aid for family counseling, putting food on the table or finding safe shelter. Now, labor and city leaders in Los Angeles want that hub of help to be your local school. SEIU Local 99, the school workers...
By Vanessa Romo | April 25, 2014
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SEIU 99 president — and board candidate — a union concern
Barbara Torres, president of SEIU Local 99, the local school workers union with 45,000 members, is raising alarms within the union over her intention to run for an LA Unified school board seat. The potential conflict is over her role as a member of the union’s bargaining committee, which is negotiating a new labor contract...
By Vanessa Romo | April 23, 2014
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SEIU 99 decides not to endorse a candidate for District 1 board seat
SEIU Local 99, the service employees union, which represents more than 30,000 cafeteria workers, custodians, bus drivers, special education assistants and other school support staff at LAUSD, has decided not to endorse a candidate for the district’s vacant District 1 Board seat. The local is the largest labor unit within LA Unified that chose not...
By LA School Report | April 14, 2014
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Unions have lukewarm response to Deasy’s new budget proposal
The budget proposal LA Unified Superintendent John Deasy will present to the school board tomorrow has won lukewarm responses from three of the district’s biggest labor partners — the teachers union (UTLA), the principals union (AALA) and the support workers union (SEIU Local 99). After reviewing documents the district released on Friday, each group expressed cautious...
By Michael Janofsky | April 7, 2014
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SEIU Local 99 starting process to endorse District 1 candidate
SEIU Local 99, one of the most powerful and influential unions in the LA Unified School District, is holding an exclusive forum next week for union members to meet the candidates running for the open District 1 board seat. With more than 30,000 cafeteria workers, special education assistants, custodians, bus drivers and others, the union...
By Yana Gracile | March 24, 2014
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Service Workers Union Looking to Expand LA Unified Role
For years, the SEIU Local 99 has been “the other union” in LAUSD. Representing custodians, cooks, bus drivers and other “classified” workers, the union is just as politically influential, if not more so, than the teachers union, UTLA. And yet its voice is rarely heard in policy debates. That might be about to change. In...
By Hillel Aron | October 4, 2013
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Service Workers Close to Winning Vote in Charter Process
A bill that would allow cafeteria workers, custodians and teacher aides to vote when a public school wants to become a charter is one vote (State Assembly) and one signature (Gov. Brown) away from becoming law. Both are expected, and it could happen within days. Currently, only teachers get to vote for conversion. But the change...
By Hillel Aron | August 28, 2013
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Joe Nunez, CTA Head, No. 2 Again in ‘Capitol Weekly’ 100
Capitol Weekly’s annual Top 100 list — what it calls a “subjective ranking of unelected political players” — is out, and for the second year in a row, Joe Nunez, the head of the California Teachers Association, is #2, just behind Ann Gust, who is Governor Jerry Brown‘s wife. The paper called the 325,000 member...
By Hillel Aron | August 21, 2013
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Slideshow: Deasy’s Cafeteria Shift
The SEIU local 99, which represents classified LAUSD employees, such as bus drivers, cafeteria workers, custodians and teaching assistants, invited Superintendent John Deasy to spend a shift “walking in their shoes” — or in their hairnets, as it were. Deasy spent the early Wednesday yesterday preparing and serving food at Esteban Torres High School in East Los...
By Hillel Aron | August 15, 2013
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Campaign 2013: How Ratliff Won (& Reformers Lost)*
The results are (mostly) in, and the LAUSD School Board District 6 election looks like the shock result of the evening, with Monica Ratliff having apparently defeated Antonio Sanchez, 52 percent to 48 percent — a complete reversal from the primary results in which Sanchez bested Ratliff by 10 points. Sanchez has now conceded the...
By Hillel Aron | May 22, 2013