May 28, 2009

San Diego is changing!

School board chooses community over traditional power interests

"San Diego is changing," as John Lee Evans told the crowd at the San Diego Unified school board meeting Tuesday night.  Developers and builders, accustomed to calling the shots here, are losing their grip in a sea change of increased community involvement and attention to the needs of working people.

Evans and his fellow board members Shelia Jackson and Richard Barrera are part of that change.  They voted Tuesday to make sure the money from school construction and renovation bonds stays in the community and gives youth and families in the district a chance at quality jobs with health insurance and stable, middle-class careers.

The board's Project Stabilization Agreement is forward-thinking, inclusive and reasonable.  Similar agreements have succeeded elsewhere in coordinating work and containing costs for major construction projects.  Yet the city's powerful construction interests are howling.

"San Diego is not used to looking at things through this lens," Evans said.

For many San Diegans, the change is long overdue.  At the board meeting Tuesday, a string of leaders from diverse community organizations testified to the value of the PSA for local residents who are struggling in the economic downturn.  Only building contractors and their employees spoke against it.

The district negotiated the agreement with the people who will be doing the work, represented by unions.  They agreed on job standards, strong local hiring goals, monitoring, accountability, training for youth, opportunities for people from disadvantaged areas of the district, and a smooth work process without disputes or interruptions.

The unions have joint labor-management apprenticeship programs that commit to provide trainees with jobs when they graduate.  They have multi-employer health insurance programs that provide stability of coverage in a traditionally unstable and largely uninsured industry.

All contractors are welcome to participate, as long as they play by the new rules.

Before she voted, board member Shelia Jackson said it is no longer enough for a school board to build schools and ignore the fact that free school meals may be the only meals some students get.  "San Diego will not be the finest city until we start increasing the number of middle-class citizens we have," she said.  "This PSA is about us moving our city in the right direction."

The Union-Tribune's editorial today, sputtering in frustration at the school board's community-minded move, got exactly one thing right:  "This is not remotely politics as usual."


Express yourself, and educate others!

The U-T editorial board needs help understanding that the union members they so vehemently oppose are community residents, voters, consumers, working people supporting families and hoping for a secure retirement -- people doing their best to live the American dream.  Union members are us.

Please help educate the editorial board.  Click here to write a letter.