LAUSD STRIKES DEAL WITH UNION TEACHERS WOULD GET 6% PAY RAISE.

Byline: NAUSH BOGHOSSIAN and PAUL CLINTON

Staff Writers

Averting a possible strike, the Los Angeles Unified School District and its teachers union reached a tentative agreement on a three-year contract late Monday that gives teachers a 6 percent raise, sources said.

The raise for United Teachers Los Angeles members is retroactive to July 1, according to those involved with the negotiations. An official announcement on the contract will take place today. The three-year deal also gives teachers the right to renegotiate salary provisions in the second and third years.

The district has also agreed to limit the number of students in high school classes to 42 and in middle school classes to 41, said Aaron Bruhnke, the UTLA's Harbor Area chairman and a social studies teacher at San Pedro High School.

"We made good on our promises of reducing the number of kids in a class and improving and personalizing instruction," Bruhnke said. "We see this as the beginning of our efforts to re-prioritize the district's budget to school sites and classrooms."

The 48,000-member union, helmed by pugnacious President A.J. Duffy, opened talks in May by asking for a 14-percent, one-year hike. The district countered in November with a 3 percent raise, retroactive to July 1, and $10 million to reduce class sizes in grades 4-12. Duffy responded with a threat to walk out over anything less than a 9 percent pay increase.

The contentious negotiations unfolded for the better part of a year, with Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's attempts to wrest control of the 720,000-student, 700-school district away from the school board hanging as the backdrop.

naush.boghossian(at)dailynews.com

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