The Association of Clovis Educators announced this week that it has filed new labor charges against Clovis Unified School District for hiring an outside agency to provide American Sign Language interpreting services, which the union says violates California labor laws.

ACE is in the process of becoming the union representative for the district’s sign language interpreters. It already represents the district’s school psychologists, and it’s also in the process of becoming the union representative for naturalists at the Sierra Outdoor School.

Although ACE is representing smaller employee groups in Clovis Unified, it still has not collected enough signatures to begin union representation of the district’s 1,877 teachers.

ACE said in a news release Wednesday that it learned that the district was employing an outside agency for ASL services when it began negotiations on the interpreters’ first contract.

The district’s subcontracted interpreting service employees are working full-time, and some are working remotely using video conferencing “at a total cost that’s more expensive than full-time employees,” ACE said. Doing so is detrimental to the students receiving services as well as the district’s finances, the union said.

Clovis Unified did not immediately provide a comment or response to ACE’s allegations.

Later Thursday afternoon Clovis Unified emailed the following: “We are currently examining the details of the charges and will respond through the PERB process as appropriate. Each year we have normal employee attrition from retirements and resignations expected during the school year and began exploring a contract for the provision of occasional short-term employees at the beginning of this school year. Districts across the nation are facing similar needs to maintain student services while onboarding permanent employees. The contract isn’t designed to replace any position in the district, but to provide a bridge of support during the hiring process to our students who, by law, require interpretation services as part of their daily instruction. We remain committed to hiring permanent employees into the open positions in our district.”

ACE: District Decisions Led to Employee Shortfalls

Interpreter Shonda Harrar said in the news release that district employees don’t object to using outside help “as a last resort.” But she said that in the past the district failed to stem the departure of staffers for better-paying jobs elsewhere. That created the situation where it now has to hire outsiders, some from as far away as Los Angeles and Washington state, to help support Clovis Unified’s deaf and hard-of-hearing students, Harrar said.

“Had the district heard our concerns years ago, we wouldn’t have lost so many interpreters to jobs that provide competitive pay and benefits,” she said.

ACE has filed other unfair labor charges against the district that have been upheld by the Public Employment Relations Board. Last June, PERB ruled that the district’s support of a Faculty Senate was designed to prevent unionization and ordered the district to disband it.

Related Story: State Board Says Clovis Unified Violated Labor Laws, Must Disband Faculty