Both sides await crucial state report
Contrary to reports in a Fresno newspaper, Madera Unified’s teachers are not 10 days away from a strike. The district and the teacher’s union are not under a 10-day deadline to find a resolution as reported in that paper Tuesday.
Superintendent Ed Gonzalez told The Madera Tribune at Tuesday’s meeting of the school board that the article was in error. Gonzalez said the district does not have the long awaited fact finder’s report, which was inaccurately reported to have been submitted to him Monday.
That report will come from state-appointed mediator Bonnie Castry and her fact-finding team who came to Madera on March 15 to hear both sides in the lengthy negotiation dispute. The district and the union are still waiting on that report, and until it arrives, there can be no strike by the teachers.
According to union president David Holder, when the fact-finding report does arrive, the district and the union will enter “impasse two,” a 10-day period, at the end of which the district must publish the report...