Schools

LAUSD Will Raise Minimum Wage for Cafeteria Workers, Custodians to $15/Hr

The agreement calls for wages to be increased to $11 an hour for the upcoming school year, $13 an hour next year and $15 an hour by 2016.

Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent John Deasy today called a tentative agreement to raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour for cafeteria workers, custodians and other school service workers "historic."

The agreement between the district and Service Employees International Union, which represents the workers, was announced Monday and approved by the LAUSD board of education today. A union ratification vote is continuing and is expected to be finalized this week.

The wage increase will benefit about 20,000 LAUSD employees who make $8 or $9 an hour.

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"The minimum wage piece here is of course historic. It is fundamentally the largest public employer in the United States who has agreed to do this," Deasy said during a news conference at LAUSD headquarters, where he was joined by LAUSD school board members and representatives from SEIU Local 99.

Nearly half of the school workers represented by Local 99 have children attending school in the district, according to the union. Another provision of the pact includes the restoration of special education work hours lost in 2012.

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Nayely Quesadas, a teacher's assistant since 2008, said she has barely been making ends meet and she's expecting another child.

"This would be very good for me. I get paid $10 and if it goes up to $15, I could probably do much more for my children with $15 an hour instead of $10," Quesadas said.

The agreement calls for wages to be increased to $11 an hour for the upcoming school year, $13 an hour next year and $15 an hour by 2016. According to the union, employees already making $15 an hour would receive a 6.64 percent increase over the next three years.

—City News Service


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