Photograph by Mattias De Los Rios
The Berkeley Unified School District (BUSD) School Board voted to consider including employee housing in a 2020 facilities bond measure at their December 6 meeting.
If included in the 2020 measure, some of the revenue from voter-approved bonds would go towards the construction of subsidized affordable units for district staff. However, the board’s vote does not ensure that housing will be included in the measure.
The board first discussed employee housing in March 2017, and referred staff to identify potential housing sites and legal, financial, and operational obstacles to consider.
The district conducted a survey in October 2017 to assess housing needs among employees. Eight hundred people, or over sixty percent of district employees, responded.
Thirty percent of respondents said they live in Berkeley. 74 percent said they would consider living in district-owned housing.
The board vote considered two options to address the staff housing deficit. One was to consider including employee housing on the facilities bond measure in 2018 or 2020. If housing was included in 2018, it would require a poll to be conducted and measure language written and approved by June 2018. The other option was the establishment of a public-private partnership to develop a mix of market-rate and lower rent employee housing.
Berkeley Federation of Teachers (BFT) President Cathy Campbell spoke at the board meeting regarding the housing proposal. She said that while employee housing could be beneficial, the district should consider the options more thoroughly before implementing a bond measure.
She suggested that a tax measure to support raising employee salaries might be a better way to support the recruitment and retention of BUSD staff. In an interview after the meeting, she said, “The main reason why it is a better option is because a parcel tax would support salaries, and salaries impact everyone, whereas subsidized housing would only impact a small segment of teachers in Berkeley.”
Campbell was pleased with the board’s decision to include employee housing on the list of considerations for a 2020 facilities bond measure. “I think that was a great outcome,” she said. “I think it provides time to study the issue more and it provides time to look at the entire bond that needs to be put together for 2020,” Campbell continued. She said there had not been sufficient discussion about what projects should be included in the bond.
Another speaker at the board meeting was Lori Nixon, a staff member at King Middle School and a member of the Political Action Committee of the Berkeley Council for Classified Employees (BCCE). Nixon expressed concern that employees are not receiving adequate housing support or compensation, and said action should be taken before the possible 2020 measure.
“I think it’s great that the school board is taking this vital step, but it needs to happen faster,” Nixon said. She said workers and their families can’t wait another two to five years for relief.
According to Nixon, some employees commute two to five hours to work each day, and work multiple jobs to keep up with their rent. The district’s survey reported that 21 percent of all employees commute more forty minutes each way to work.
Nixon said that BUSD employees are negatively impacted by long commutes and other effects of the high cost of living in Berkeley. “Financial and housing stress absolutely affects workers’ ability to focus on the job at hand,” she said.
According to the district’s survey, 78 percent of employees who are renters are under financial stress due to high housing prices, and 54 percent of them said they had considered leaving BUSD for that reason. Fifty percent of all respondents said they know an employee who has left the district due to the cost of housing.
A Malcolm X teacher who spoke at the meeting said that if more employees move out of the district, students success may be affected. “Turnover will certainly be hard on students, especially those who need structure and regularity at school the most,” she said. In the survey, 69 percent of renters said that high rents decrease their ability to stay in Berkeley long term.
However, Campbell cautioned that employee housing is a complex response that may not have the desired effect on employee retention if implemented hastily.
Campbell referenced an employee housing initiative in Los Angeles Unified School District that, she said, had mixed results. “I think the goal of [the LAUSD project] was to provide teacher and classified staff funding … but in the end only classified staff lived in the housing, and that was because you had to make below a certain income level, and so teachers did not qualify,” she said.
School Board member Karen Hemphill said at the meeting that she would be interested in further research into a public-private partnership option. “If we’re going to ask the taxpayers for something for our teachers and for our classified staff, I would much rather it be for additional funding for salaries,” Hemphill said.
Several teachers and classified staff spoke at the meeting regarding the high cost of living and working in Berkeley. They requested additional support in several areas, including increased salaries, healthcare coverage, and subsidized housing.
Board members commented on the importance of housing, but also highlighted financial pressures due to budget cuts. Nixon suggested that advocating for health care legislation would help employees, in addition to housing.