Over a thousand teachers union members agreed to give Fresno Unified a Sept. 29 deadline to reach a new contract deal during a rally that shut down an entire block of N Street in downtown Fresno Wednesday evening.

If the two parties don’t reach an agreement, the Fresno Teachers Association – which represents over 4,000 teachers, nurses, social workers, and trades professionals – vowed to take a strike authorization vote come October.

“Systemic changes in this district have only happened when educators have taken collective action,” said Fresno Teachers Association president Manuel Bonilla, addressing what he called a “sea” of teachers flooding N Street in bright blue FTA shirts.

“We have a plan on how to transform public education in Fresno,” he told The Bee’s Education Lab before the rally. “The district is lacking in a response – doesn’t have a plan. We’re tired of (them) dragging this on.”

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The parties opened contract talks in November in advance of the current contract’s expiration date of June 30.

No agreement has been reached – and tensions have been high as the union has accused the district of failing to provide an adequate response to their detailed plan to “reimagine education” in Fresno. Meanwhile, the district has been critical of the union for not adhering to its bargaining ground rules.

On Wednesday night, the union handed over to the district the latest version of their plan – which members said is their last, best and final offer. The Fresno Unified trustees were convened for a board meeting just down the street.

District spokesperson Nikki Henry told the Ed Lab in an interview after the rally that, without having seen the proposal, she couldn’t say whether the district will meet the union’s deadline.

“Without that, I don’t know how far apart we are,” she said.

However, she’s “confident” the parties will be able to reach an agreement that’s “mutually beneficial and really supportive for our teachers.”

FTA’s rally comes during an eventful week for educator unions in Fresno County.

Dissatisfied with current contract negotiations, educators working for the Fresno County Superintendent of Schools’ office and Parlier Unified School District both organized their own rallies Tuesday.

On the same day Fresno teachers rallied in support of a contract, the Association of Clovis Educators tweeted that they reached a tentative agreement with Clovis Unified that includes a 13.75% pay raise for the mental health professionals.

What are the sticking points?

Teachers who spoke at Wednesday’s rally voiced a number of concerns, including with the special education department.

Tanya Salzer, a special education teacher at Fresno High, told the Ed Lab the students she works with are in dire need of more social emotional support – something the union says requires a multimillion dollar investment by the district.

“It’s really difficult for me to tell a student, ‘Do you want to go talk to your social worker?” she said, “and they’re like, ‘I can’t go talk to her. She’s always busy. She’s always dealing with somebody else.’ There’s a crisis happening.”

Another issue of particular concern was classroom safety.

“If you’ve had students with discipline issues and you’ve gotten no support this year, can you make some noise?” said Edison High teacher Trish Renfro to deafening cries from the crowd of educators.

This has been a growing concern from teachers in recent school years. Dozens of teachers at Fresno High and Wawona K-8 School have spoken out at recent board meetings about increasing student violence on campus, insisting that the district’s status quo isn’t working.

Bargaining team members also criticized the district for a lack of transparency throughout the bargaining process.

Taylor Vizthum, a Computech Middle School teacher and FTA bargaining chair, said he was particularly disappointed with the most recent response the district sent FTA last week.

“Many times throughout the document, when they are talking about their own programs, they say: ‘Insert details. Details needed. Add details,’” he said.

“I wouldn’t accept that from my students,” he added. “I certainly shouldn’t be accepting it from the superintendent.”

Henry said the parties’ original agreement to use “Interest Based Bargaining” helps explain why Fresno Unified’s responses haven’t been as detailed as the union has demanded.

Unlike the traditional method of passing detailed proposals back and forth, the strategy involves identifying mutual interests and collaborating on contract language.

“(In) Interest Based Bargaining, you don’t provide proposed language and writing, okay?” she said. “That’s not within the ground rules or the principles of IBB.”

Henry added that last Friday, however, the district decided to cancel Interest Based Bargaining meetings and revert to traditional bargaining moving forward.

“So for us to be able to meet their needs and continue effective bargaining, we have to turn to traditional (bargaining),” she said, “so that we can provide them a full proposal.”

The district will provide that by June 1, Henry said.

What has happened in contract talks so far?

The last time the teachers union voted to strike was in 2017 – at the beginning of FUSD Superintendent Bob Nelson’s tenure – although the parties reached an agreement that ultimately averted a strike.

But this isn’t the first time a potential strike has come up during the current bargaining cycle.

In April, tension mounted after the district publicly accused the union of planning a strike authorization vote for later that month.

Bonilla denied any such plans and fired back that the accusation was “an attempt to create fear and panic throughout our community.”

That came roughly a year after the teachers union first went public with a draft of their proposals in April 2022.

Their initial document made waves for its proposed multimillion-dollar investments for not only teachers but also students.

The union suggested investing $1 million in free laundry service for all students by 2026, for example, and another $1 million to fund free clothes and school supplies for students in need.

Other costly ideas, like resetting lifetime health benefits for teachers, sparked debate among trustees.

In November, when the union and district formally opened contract talks, many of FTA’s proposals remained intact word-for-word in a 26-page document.

The document included requests for as much as a 7.26% raise plus 100% district-paid healthcare, up from the current 95/5 employer- to employee-covered ratio. Despite raises in recent years, teacher pay in Fresno and across California still failed to keep up with rising inflation.

The district’s more high-level, three-page document stated its interest in updating contract language around several key issues, including class sizes, sick leave and student supervision requirements.

The union took issue with some of those bullet points – especially one that suggested “including student academic growth” in employee evaluations. Some members spoke out against tying students’ test scores to performance reviews at a Dec. 7 board meeting.

The district emphasized that the idea and others in their initial document were “interests,” not proposals, in line with the tenets of an interest-based bargaining approach.

In March, the union celebrated a small win after the district said its middle schools would receive new laundry machines in an announcement that seemed to echo the union’s proposal to provide students with free laundry service. Trustee Andy Levine thanked the union for bringing the idea forward last April.

The bargaining teams will continue to meet over the summer, Henry said.

The Education Lab is a local journalism initiative that highlights education issues critical to the advancement of the San Joaquin Valley. It is funded by donors. Learn about The Bee’s Education Lab at its website.