A demonstration of about 40 teachers, staff, parents and students outside Sheridan School District’s administration building in Englewood on Tuesday evening quickly escalated into a showdown, with Sheridan police threatening to arrest picketers if they did not step off district property.
The confrontation happened just before the start of a school board meeting and the night before teachers planned to go on strike. District leaders and school board members called law enforcement to the administration building, saying they did not feel safe as protesters chanted outside.
Members of the Sheridan Education Association gathered ahead of the meeting to urge the board to resume teacher contract negotiations, which have stalled in recent months and left educators without an active contract all school year.
“We wanted to provide positive pressure on the school board to encourage them to do the right thing for their community, to call us back to make any sort of offer to return to the table to find a resolution to our dispute,” union president Kate Biester told The Colorado Sun.
The run-in with police ratcheted up tensions that had already gained steam throughout the day, with the district announcing it would cancel classes for the rest of the week beginning Wednesday, the same day union members plan to strike.
Protesters who showed up Tuesday evening planned to attend the public portions of the board meeting before the board met in executive session. When they were locked out of the administration building, they looked through the doors at board members inside and began chanting, “You can’t have transparency behind closed doors.”
Biester said one school board member requested she call him and he explained he felt threatened by the crowd, refusing to let anyone enter the building. Demonstrators continued picketing until police arrived a few minutes later and approached Biester, telling her she would be arrested if the group did not exit district grounds and move to the sidewalk hugging the street, she said.
“I was trying to stay calm, but I was pretty uncomfortable in that situation,” Biester said, adding she was also confused because she believed that employees and community members were allowed to be on the property. She said she has never before been prohibited from entering the building during a private board meeting.
Protesters were eventually allowed to walk inside, staying in the meeting for the first few minutes before the board moved to executive session.
“I worry that a school district that is willing to call the cops on their teachers and parents and students may not be as deeply committed to finding a resolution as they say they are,” Biester said.
The union will still walk off the job Wednesday morning, she said, unless she hears from the board late Tuesday night with a proposal to return to the bargaining table.
When asked for a comment Tuesday evening, Superintendent Gionni Thompson said he would issue a public statement Wednesday morning.
In a message posted to the district’s website for families of the district’s 924 students earlier in the day, Thompson wrote that the decision to cancel classes was meant “to prioritize student safety” without enough staff to keep schools operating as normal.
“We understand that this disruption creates challenges for our students, families, and community, and we appreciate your patience and flexibility,” the message stated. “Sheridan School District 2 remains committed to working in good faith with (the Sheridan Education Association) to reach an agreement that supports our students, values our educators, and is fiscally responsible to our community.”
The local union and district and board leaders have been in gridlock over contract negotiations for close to a year, with both sides accusing the other of failing to be responsive in efforts to resume negotiating.
Sheridan Education Association members in early March voted overwhelmingly in favor of authorizing a strike, Colorado Public Radio reported. That vote came after union members gathered for a demonstration outside the district’s administration building in Englewood in December calling for district leadership to reinstate their contract and recognize the union.
The months leading up to the rally took on a contentious tone in the small Denver metro district. Negotiations began last spring with incremental progress, though were still tense. That progress stalled at the end of May when the union and district hit an impasse while trying to hash out details around compensation.
The contract expired July 31, with district leaders and union leaders blaming each other for not doing their part to keep communications open and nail down new terms of the contract over the summer.
Between the December rally and the union’s approval of a strike, Biester said the union and district “loosely” communicated over email without any meaningful momentum toward a new agreement.
“We have not received any sort of counter offer or no point-for-point negotiation,” she said. “It’s just like nothing.”
The district began to take the union more seriously after its vote to initiate a strike, Biester said. The union met with Thompson on March 12 as “a starting point for the conversation,” she noted. She said Thompson told union representatives board members could potentially discuss negotiations during a March 18 board meeting.
Instead, the board said it would update the union during its April 2 meeting, which was then rescheduled to Tuesday evening, according to Biester.
Biester said she does not know whether the board has reviewed the union’s latest offer and has not been able to reach board members to try to restart negotiations.
School district focused on “finding common ground”
In the district’s statement, Thompson wrote that district leaders and the board “remain focused on productive dialogue and finding common ground.”
“We are committed to returning to the negotiating table and are hopeful for a timely resolution,” he wrote in the statement.
The union wants the district to reinstate its contract and recognize the union for its collective bargaining power and to recognize classified staff who work as education support professionals, such as bus drivers and janitors, as members of the bargaining unit. The union also wants district leaders to retract policies spelling out rules that dictate how someone would approach forming a union in the district and disciplinary policies that union members say have led to retaliation against union members, including some staff being dismissed. Biester declined to comment on specifics of educators losing their jobs.
The union will carry on with the strike as a last resort, Biester said.
“I have faith in this community and in this school board to do the right thing, and I’m trying my hardest to keep that faith and I will keep pushing towards a resolution to this issue because our students deserve it.”
The district will make to-go lunches available for students and families at Fort Logan Northgate, a Denver school serving kids in grades 4-8, while classes are not in session.