The next day, Octo­ber 21, CTA filed an unfair labor prac­tice charge with the Pub­lic Employ­ees Rela­tions Board against SLUSD, argu­ing that the school dis­trict had vio­lat­ed Cal­i­for­nia state labor law. Guiller­mo Dur­gin, the CTA staff orga­niz­er speak­ing with the deputies in the video, told In These Times, ​“By try­ing to keep me out of the class­room, and then try­ing to inter­rupt our union meet­ing, the dis­trict is essen­tial­ly intim­i­dat­ing and pre­vent­ing mem­bers from com­mu­ni­cat­ing with their exclu­sive bar­gain­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tive about the impasse that had been declared.”

In a video wide­ly cir­cu­lat­ed on social media , Alame­da Coun­ty sheriff’s deputies can be seen inter­rupt­ing a lunchtime union meet­ing held at San Loren­zo High on Octo­ber 20 for local teach­ers in the midst of a con­tract bar­gain­ing dis­pute with their employ­er, the San Loren­zo Uni­fied School Dis­trict (SLUSD). The deputies, there at the request of a vice prin­ci­pal, entered the class­room where the meet­ing was being held and asked a Cal­i­for­nia Teach­ers Asso­ci­a­tion (CTA) rep­re­sen­ta­tive lead­ing the meet­ing to leave campus.

The CTA-affil­i­at­ed San Loren­zo Edu­ca­tion Asso­ci­a­tion (SLEA) has been in col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing nego­ti­a­tions since March, but reached an impasse on Octo­ber 13. Dur­gin was invit­ed on to cam­pus by SLEA mem­bers to inform San Loren­zo High edu­ca­tors about the bar­gain­ing sit­u­a­tion dur­ing their off-duty lunch hour break.

After sign­ing in as a vis­i­tor at the school’s office, Dur­gin says he was approached by assis­tant prin­ci­pal Andrew Vavuris. He claims that he iden­ti­fied him­self as a union rep­re­sen­ta­tive with the Cal­i­for­nia Teach­ers Asso­ci­a­tion, inform­ing Vavuris that he had signed in and why he was there.

“He pro­ceed­ed to tell me that I did not have the right to be there and I need to leave. I pro­ceed­ed to tell him that I actu­al­ly did have the right to be there as a rep­re­sen­ta­tive of their exclu­sive bar­gain­ing rep­re­sen­ta­tive,” he says. ​“About 15 min­utes lat­er — for­tu­nate­ly we had gone through most of our agen­da — the assis­tant prin­ci­pal returned with three Alame­da Coun­ty Sher­iff, and they pro­ceed­ed to inter­rupt our union meet­ing, say­ing I had to leave. After a minute of this one of our mem­bers start­ed to record.”

After the video stopped record­ing, Dur­gin says, ​“At that point, I pret­ty much ignored the three Alame­da Coun­ty Sher­iffs as well as the assis­tant prin­ci­pal, left the class­room, signed out and pro­ceed­ed to my car. I noticed though that the assis­tant prin­ci­pal actu­al­ly fol­lowed me to my car… just to make sure I was going to leave the school campus.”

In an email to In These Times, SLUSD super­in­ten­dent Fred Brill says that what tran­spired in the video, which has been seen over 280,000 times, was a result of a ​“mis­un­der­stand­ing” and that ​“the assis­tant prin­ci­pal should not have inter­fered with the meeting.”

“When an unknown vis­i­tor comes onto cam­pus, even if they claim to be from CTA, the admin­is­tra­tion will con­sid­er the safe­ty of stu­dents very seri­ous­ly and work to con­firm that vis­i­tors are who they claim to be. The safe­ty of stu­dents must come first,“ Brill added, alleg­ing that although Dur­gin had a vis­i­tor’s badge he had declined to give his name to administration.

With nego­ti­a­tions at an impasse, a state-appoint­ed medi­a­tor has met with SLEA and the school dis­trict twice, bring­ing the almost 600 mem­bers of SLEA close to a poten­tial work stop­page. The union says that its main con­cerns lie in the district’s inabil­i­ty to recruit and retain edu­ca­tors due to low salary lev­els and the sub­se­quent high class sizes that come with no hir­ing. An Octo­ber 23 press release by SLEA claims that the 2015 – 16 school year ​“start­ed with more than 25 unfilled edu­ca­tor vacan­cies, four times as many as two neigh­bor­ing dis­tricts in Cas­tro Val­ley and San Lean­dro. More than 70 edu­ca­tors left the dis­trict at the end of last school year — 30 of them going to high­er-pay­ing school districts.”

SLEA pres­i­dent Don­na Pinkney says in the state­ment, ​“The school board and Super­in­ten­dent Brill are refus­ing to make a long-term invest­ment in teach­ers by mak­ing com­pet­i­tive salaries a bud­get pri­or­i­ty, and that’s harm­ing the stu­dents and the com­mu­ni­ty. Teach­ers are leav­ing the dis­trict for bet­ter pay and more respect in neigh­bor­ing dis­tricts. Inter­fer­ing with our union rights will not be tol­er­at­ed here.”