Teachers' union locks horns with CVUSD trustee
By Kyle Jorrey kjorrey@theacorn.com

The ongoing battle between the Conejo Valley teachers' union and trustee Mike Dunn was taken to a new level last week when the union made good on its threats to hold the school board member accountable for interfering in negotiations over the timing of winter break.

The union filed an unfair labor practice charge against the school district-aimed at Dunn-with the state Public Employee Relations Board (PERB), an agency that oversees collective bargaining law covering public employees.

According to Arleigh Kidd, executive director of the union, Dunn was in violation of the law when he sent an e-mail poll to district teachers asking for their opinion on when winter break should start. At that time, the district's bargaining staff was involved in ongoing negotiations with the teachers' union over the calendar.

"When it comes to bargaining, by law, the association is the explicit representative of its members," Kidd said. "Therefore, only the association can poll its members and represent their opinion."

Kidd said the union sent a "cease and desist" letter to Dunn in December, demanding that he stop releasing the results of his teachers' poll or be prepared to face an unfair labor practice charge. Since then, union president Susan Falk and other union members have repeated those warnings at several school board meetings, most recently on March 14.

Falk said the union wouldn't have gone through with the lawsuit if Dunn had agreed to put the issue to bed.

"We kept warning him, but he continued to talk about the calendar and the results and trying to release them," said Falk. Dunn asked her again on March 14 if he could release the results of his poll, she said.

Dunn said he believes he did comply, that he didn't try to release the results of the teachers' portion of his poll after receiving the letter and discovering that it was considered to be illegal.

He said what drove the union to file the claim wasn't his poll, but instead Dunn's lone vote against the proposed calendar during the March 28 meeting. That calendar added a single day to the winter break.

"I thought (the filing of charges) was punishment for the way I'd voted the previous night," said Dunn, who's been at odds with the teachers' union since being elected in November 2004. "I don't think they would have filed if I voted yes on the calendar."

Although the union's lawsuit was announced the day after that March 28 meeting, Kidd said there was no correlation between Dunn's vote and the timing of the claim, which had actually been filed with PERB on March 24.

Falk said the union felt Dunn's earlier actions left them no choice but to take legal action.

"We didn't want to do it. We did it because we felt we had to protect the rights of our members, so he knew in the future he couldn't muddy the waters of negotiations," Falk said.

The matter now goes to PERB, which will review the allegation and decide whether or not any law was violated, according to general counsel Robert Thompson.

If the board chooses to file a complaint, it will bring together the union and the school district for mediation. If mediation fails, the matter would then go before an administrative law judge, who would conduct a formal hearing before issuing a final decision.

Superintendent Robert Fraisse said he expects the issue to be resolved in mediation.

"To me, this is not an issue we should be spending a lot of time on," Fraisse said. "I'm hoping it's resolved at the very lowest level so we can put all of our energy and resources into educating the kids for the rest of the year."

Dunn said he accepts fault for polling the teachers, blaming his actions on inexperience, but he added, "My intentions were to promote better democracy."

"I've made one mistake since being elected-and that was polling the teachers," Dunn said. "That's the only mistake I think I've made, despite all the criticism, propaganda and misinformation put out by the teachers' union."

Dunn continues to say that his actions relating to the calendar "are only meant to represent the will of the people."

He also stands by his poll of residents, although Dunn added that he doesn't have accurate statistics of how many people replied. According to Dunn, his poll revealed "81 percent of the community wanted vacation to start on either December 16 or 20."

"After the poll I was confident that I knew what the will of the people was," Dunn said. "That's my job, to find out what the people want and then represent them when I vote."