Salinas Valley Federation of Teachers to have informational picketing at SUHSD job fair

SALINAS, Calif. (KION-TV): The Salinas Valley Federation of Teachers will be picketing at the Salinas Union High School District job fair that is set to take place on Saturday.

Steve McDougall who is the labor representative for the Salinas Valley Federation of Teachers told KION that this is happening due to a multitude of reasons. McDougall said that the district has been giving poor employee evaluations, unfair labor practices and a failure in addressing diversity within the district.

During Tuesday's district board meeting, Superintendent Dan Burns did say that schools are experiencing an increase in fights and swarming.

"Now there is a new trend called swarming," Burns said. "Kids are organizing fights between students and having large student presence and not letting adults in."

Burns did say an increase of homophobic and racial slurs being said on campus.

The federation said that administrators have allowed unsafe and violent student bodies to take over the schools with little to no accountability by adminstrators who run those schools/

McDougall did say that the federation has refused to negotiate signing bonuses with the district to protect potential co-workers from harmful working environment.

We did reach out to the Salinas Union High School District for comment about the federation's claims and here is what they said in a statement.

"The district will host a job fair on Saturday beginning at 9 a.m. at the National Steinbeck Center. We look forward to inviting the community to learn about all of the career opportunities available in our district. We will also continue to work in person with our union leaders to address concerns."

The district job fair will take place on Saturday from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Steinbeck Center on 1 Main Street in Salinas.