Dozens of employees with an Evergreen Public Schools employee union picketed outside district headquarters Tuesday as a strike of classified staff stretched into its second week.

Members of the Evergreen chapter of the Public School Employees of Washington SEIU Local 1948 said they are seeing better pay and working conditions for their 1,400 members in the East Vancouver school district.

As of Tuesday morning, negotiations had stalled.

“They’re not bargaining in good faith,” said Mindy Troffer-Cooper, the Public School Employees union president for Evergreen Public Schools.

The district and union have been in negotiations since March. The strike is a first for the district’s classified staff union, which represents paraeducators, mechanics, bus drivers, and custodians, among others.

The main sticking point between the two sides is pay, according to Troffer-Cooper. The union would like its paraeducators to get a 15% raise over the length of their three-year contract to help retain staff. The union is seeking a pay increase of 9.5% for mechanics and 12% for other classified staff over the next three years.

Craig Birnbach, the spokesperson for Evergreen Public Schools, was not immediately available for an update from the district about negotiations or when they might expect students to begin the school year.

So far, the district has proposed pay increases of 4.5% for paraeducators, 3.5% for transportation, maintenance staff and mechanics, and a 2.5% increase for service workers. But those raises are less substantial in the second and third years of the contract.

The Evergreen Public School district is facing a $26 million shortfall over the next three years. The union’s contract allows them to return to work under the same terms and still negotiate for one year after their previous contract has expired.

“This year we decided as a group that that wasn’t in our best interests,” Troffer-Cooper said. “This district has broken faith with a lot of their employees, and so we decided that we have to do something different.”

In addition to Evergreen Public Schools, unions at two other Southwest Washington school districts are undergoing contract negotiations, though neither have yet gone on strike.

Last week, classified staff with Vancouver Public Schools who are members of the Vancouver Association of Educational Support Professionals returned to class. But the union set Sept. 11 as the date for a potential strike if they’re unable to reach an agreement with their district.

Certified employees in the La Center Education Association went back to school on Aug. 27, but they’re still in the middle of pay negotiations for a cost-of-living adjustment with the La Center School District.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2025/09/02/evergreen-public-schools-strike-pushes-into-second-week-as-negotiations-stall/