The teachers union was moving forward Thursday with plans to hold a new vote on a proposed contract that teachers soundly rejected in January, despite the governor’s contention that the proposal has “no legal standing.”
Wil Okabe, Hawaii State Teachers Association president, said the union wants to hold another vote because it feels strongly that the rejected tentative agreement “is a good one and that teachers should have an opportunity to reconsider it.”
The union caught the state off guard Wednesday when it announced it would hold a second ratification vote on a proposed contract that was voted down 2-to-1 by teachers in January.
Gov. Neil Abercrombie said Thursday the state attorney general determined the rejected contract proposal now “has no legal standing” and that any ratification vote would have to be on a new agreement that is “clear, current and correct.”
Abercrombie also stressed that the decision by the teachers union to hold a second vote on the rejected proposal was “entirely an internal union action in which we have had no participation.”
“We look forward to crafting an agreement with the HSTA to be submitted to teachers for ratification,” he said in a statement.
Abercrombie spokeswoman Donalyn Dela Cruz said the state and union will sit down Monday for a bargaining session, scheduled before the union’s announcement on the second vote.
Dela Cruz said the union canceled its last two bargaining sessions, on April 30 and May 1.
Given the disagreement, it is unclear what would happen if teachers were to ratify the contract offer, a six-year deal that includes the move to a controversial performance management system in the 2013-14 school year.
But taking another vote on a rejected contract is not unprecedented in public-sector talks. In 2010, Baltimore city teachers approved a contract that included pay increases tied to performance evaluations, just weeks after rejecting it.
HSTA has said the decision to hold a new vote on the rejected proposal is “driven by the urgency to preserve” the state’s $75 million federal Race to the Top grant.
In an email to the Star-Advertiser on Thursday, Okabe said the union believes that given more time and more information, teachers will see the proposal as a “good and viable agreement.”
He added, “Time is of the essence because of the Race to the Top grant.”
No date for the vote has been set, but the union will begin a series of informational meetings for teachers statewide Monday.
The second vote is another twist in a lengthy back-and-forth between the state and HSTA that began in July, when the state imposed a contract for teachers.
Under the January proposal, teachers would continue to see 5 percent wage reductions through June 30, 2013, before moving to a new salary schedule that recognizes their years of service.
The department also would move to a revised teacher evaluation system that takes into account student academic growth. Teachers rated “effective” or “highly effective” would be eligible for 1 percent raises annually.
The new contract would run retroactively from July 1, 2011, through June 30, 2017.
The evaluation system was among the greatest concerns teachers had about the rejected proposal. Teachers said they wanted more details on what the system would be like and how it would be used in key personnel decisions, such as compensation and tenure.
The move to a performance-based management system was among the key pledges the state made to secure a federal Race to the Top grant.
The state’s slower-than-promised pace of reforms since the grant was awarded in 2010 prompted the U.S. Department of Education to place the grant on high-risk status in December and warn that it could be lost unless substantial gains were made soon.
Federal reviewers visited the state in March to determine whether Hawaii is making progress on its goals. The results of the visit are expected to be released soon.
