SEIU Local 99 is a California-based government-worker local union of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), a union that represents service workers in both the private and public sectors. SEIU Local 99 operates in Los Angeles, Ventura, and San Bernardino counties in southern California. The union claims to represent over 35,000 education workers. ^[1]

SEIU Local 99 is also a member of Child Care Providers United, a coalition of three labor unions that represent childcare workers in California. Established in 2019, Child Care Providers United is permitted to organize on behalf of approximately 40,000 eligible members. SEIU Local 99, SEIU Local 521, and the United Domestic Workers Alliance operate the coalition. ^[2]

Background

SEIU Local 99 is made up of 35,000 public school employees in the Los Angeles, California area. The union includes non-teacher school staff members, including teachers’ assistants, playground workers, special education assistants, bus drivers, gardeners, custodians, cafeteria workers, maintenance workers, and early care workers. SEIU Local 99 also has members who work in colleges, family childcare centers, and school administrative offices. ^[3]

SEIU Local 99 represents public school employees in Los Angeles, Ventura, and San Bernardino counties in southern California. The union frequently negotiates for increased pay and benefits for public school employees, while also supporting a broad left-of-center agenda by supporting left-progressive candidates for public office. SEIU Local 99 has supported increased taxpayer funding for public education to provide enhanced benefits to public school employees. ^[4]

SEIU Local 99 represents employees in several public school and community college districts around Southern California, most notably those of the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), the second largest public school district in the United States after New York City. ^[5]

Advocacy

SEIU Local 99 frequently engages in public advocacy campaigns. In 2019, the union strongly advocated for the passage of California Assembly Bill 378, which granted labor unions the power to organize childcare providers. In the wake of the legislation, SEIU Local 99, SEIU Local 521, and the United Domestic Workers Alliance formed Child Care Providers United, a statewide union of childcare workers which claims to represent 40,000 workers. ^[6]

SEIU Local 99 has also organized several strikes in solidarity with United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) and other education-related unions. In 2018, employee members of SEIU Local 99 staged a 24-hour strike in solidarity with UTLA teachers in support of higher teacher salaries. ^[7] The following year, when teachers from the LAUSD went on strike again, SEIU Local 99 warned its members that their jobs might not be protected if they joined a sympathy strike, but the union encouraged its members to strike nonetheless. ^[8]

In 2020, SEIU got involved in the LAUSD school board elections, which became the most expensive, negative school board election in the state’s history. ^{[9] [10]} SEIU Local 99 supported the school board candidates who were backed by UTLA, contributing $226,000 together with the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor to support left-progressive candidates. ^[11]

Aside from supporting left-of-center approaches to public education, SEIU Local 99 has aligned itself more broadly with left-progressive politics, describing its members as “standard bearers in the struggle for social, economic, global justice and civil liberties.” ^[12]

COVID-19 Efforts

During the COVID-19 pandemic, SEIU Local 99 became especially active in resisting a return to in-person instruction. In summer 2020, LAUSD teachers voted against reopening in-person learning for the fall term, a position that SEIU Local 99 supported. ^[13]

As California sought to re-open schools in spring 2021, SEIU Local 99 joined teachers and administrative unions to push for some of the strictest protocols in the country as a condition on reopening Los Angeles Unified schools. In addition to the safety protocols, SEIU Local 99 secured a $500 monthly childcare stipend for school employees returning to work. ^[14] The request by SEIU Local 99 faced major backlash from the public and even from the political left, especially from essential workers in grocery stores and healthcare who did not receive such subsidies, despite being unable to work from home during the COVID-19 pandemic. ^[15]

As a condition on reopening, SEIU Local 99 has also pushed for “hero pay” wage increases for school administrative employees. After LAUSD and Hacienda La Puente Unified secured an additional $5 per hour in pay for essential workers, SEIU Local 99 led calls in the Santa Monica-Malibu Unified School District to institute the same pay raises in March 2021. ^[16]

In spring 2021, LAUSD announced a proposal to increase the 180-day school year to 186 days in 2021-2022 to make up for the loss of in-person instruction during the COVID-19 pandemic. SEIU Local 99 broke with local teachers’ unions and parent advocacy organizations and supported the measure, claiming that keeping kids in school longer would meet the “basic needs” of low-income students in the district. Due to opposition, LAUSD eventually withdrew the proposal. ^[17]

Leadership

Max Arias is the current executive director of SEIU Local 99. ^[18] Arias is a longtime SEIU operative, previously working as the assistant director of collective bargaining and representation for the Hospital Division of SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West (SEIU-UHW). Prior to moving to California, Arias was chief contract negotiator with SEIU Healthcare and SEIU Local 4 in Chicago, in addition to helping to found SEIU Local 79 in 2004. ^[19]