SEATTLE — A judge on Friday ordered striking Pasco teachers to return to school on Tuesday, one week after their walkout began, while contract talks continued in Seattle under threat of another strike.
Teachers were also on strike in the South Whidbey Island school district, while Spokane narrowly avoided a walkout by all school employees when a tentative contract agreement was reached Thursday.
Calling the Pasco strike illegal, Franklin County Judge Alex Ekstrom granted an injunction requested by the Pasco School District to force teachers back to the classroom.
Union president Greg Olson told teachers after the ruling was announced that the union had not decided whether teachers should return to school after the holiday weekend. He said a decision would be made in the next few days.
Ekstrom wrote in his order that failure to fully comply might subject violators to contempt of court sanctions, but he did not set a fine. Another hearing was set for Tuesday.
“The continued strike activity by the association and its members is causing great harm to the district, its students and the public, which is substantial, immediate and irreparable,” the judge wrote.
Classes had been scheduled to begin Tuesday in Pasco, but schools have been closed all week as negotiators met with a state mediator to try to reach a new contract agreement. The district serves about 17,000 students in southeast Washington.
In Seattle, teachers voted Thursday to go on strike Wednesday if they do not have a tentative contract by then.
The walkouts in Pasco and on Whidbey Island were the first teacher strikes in Washington since Tacoma teachers went on strike in 2011. Kent teachers went on strike in 2009.
In Seattle, the state’s largest school district, teachers have not gone on strike for 30 years.
Parents at a popular playground at Seattle Center expressed solidarity with the teachers and didn’t seem concerned about the possibility they might go on strike on the first day of school.
Christine Droker, who will have two children at Greenwood Elementary School this year, said she’s behind the teachers even though she’ll probably have to bring her kids to work or her husband will need to stay home if there’s a strike.
“They are standing up for things that are good for my kids,” Droker said as she watched one of her sons climb down a two-story rope-and-metal tower.
One of the items on the teacher’s contract wish list is more recess time. None of the schools in Seattle has the amount of recess time the state of Washington recommends, said Droker, an educator working in early learning.
“The kids need to play more,” she said.
Shelley McKeever, who has a child starting kindergarten, said she is not worried about the strike and expects kids will make up the time they might miss at the end of the school year.
“Most people are definitely supportive of the teachers,” she said.
