what a week in the Clark County School District.

Too many teachers calling out sick led to several schools closing their doors.

The school district claims its largest teacher's union, the Clark County Education Association, is behind the so-called rolling sickout and took the union to court.

Rocio Hernandez from the Nevada Independent was there in court and joins us now.

And Rochelle, what did the judge decide?

So the judge said that there was an overwhelming amount of evidence, even though it was circumstantial evidence, that showed that there was indeed a strike that occurred.

And she officially called the sick outs that we've been seeing for the past two weeks a strike.

And so she issued a preliminary injunction against the teachers union, basically telling them that the strike needs to stop.

And if the strike continues, there will be consequences for continued violations.

What would some of those consequences be?

So the continuation of a strike, if it continues, it could result in a fine of $50,000 for the organization, meaning s.p.a. And then there would also be a fines of up to $1,000 for each officer.

And those are fines per day now for the individual employee.

There could be disciplinary actions, including termination or withholding of partial or all pay for these continue to stick out.

And will you remind our viewers why a strike is not allowed in Nevada?

So under Nevada law, strikes are prohibited by public employees because they offer certain services that you can't get anywhere else, like, say, a hotel closes down.

I mean, you can just find another hotel.

But a public school is a little different because that's the school that your students are supposed to be going to.

It's not like you can just go and pick up your student and take them to another school for the day.

You know, it's it's not that easy.

So the law and A discourages teachers and other public employees from doing strikes because these are essential services that we couldn't do without.

According to your reporting, CCR denied having anything to do with these sick outs.

The school district believes that they are a strike, a form of striking, which the judge upheld that belief.

And the reason behind the strike is that teachers are upset that they haven't gotten their contracts, what they wanted out of their contracts.

That's what the school district believes is behind them, so-called striking.

Right.

So where do those negotiations currently stand between the teachers union and the school district?

Well, even before this hearing on Wednesday, we had heard that the school district officially declared what's called an impasse.

And what that means is basically Kia and the school district have been going back and forth for several sessions now, and they still haven't come to an agreement on their contract.

So now they're going to call in a third party to come in and settle things with them.

So they will look at that third party, will look at all the revenue that CCSD has, which disposable to to its disposal to see exactly how much money they have to be able to afford.

Teacher raises or the other points that Kia is asking for.

They're going to take a look at what the school district is offering.

They're going to take a look at what the teachers union wants and they're going to come together and decide between them.

And the arbitrator is going to make a final decision based on the information that it's received.

And they're going to give a ruling.

And that ruling should be binding, given that the school district does have the money to provide for those raises.

And they're going to give an estimate also as to the final decision and what that will cost the school district.

Does arbitration benefit one side over the other?

So Kia will say that the third party is a good person to come into these negotiations because they will be neutral.

You know, they will be able to look at exactly all the revenue that the district has and the case says that the school district hasn't been forthcoming as to all the revenue it does have at its disposal.

And that's one of the big arguments that they've been making when it comes to the contract agreements.

They would say they don't have enough money to afford everything it wants.

So Kia does welcome someone coming in and making sure that those claims that the district is making are valid.

And in past negotiations when it has come to this arbitration process.

KIA has been successful so far, but it's and it's unclear, you know, to know exactly what the arbitrator will find in the end.

And our viewers got to be asking, what is it that these teachers want, in the simplest terms of the 10% raise in the first year of a new contract, 8% in the second year?

How long could arbitration take?

So I heard from the executive director that past sessions have taken anywhere from like nine months to more than a year.

And so it wasn't something that Kia necessarily wanted it to come to because it takes so long.

And in all this time, what's going to happen is morale between the teachers is going to go down.

That's one of the main things that they've been worried about, is that teachers are tired of working without a contract.

They want to see these raises go through and they want to see the district agree to these raises and make them feel like they are valued.

So is concerned that we already have a large number of teacher vacancies and that these vacancies will be exacerbated as this continues to drag out and until, you know, none of us knows exactly when this will all be resolved.

We will be following this as it moves through arbitration.

Rachelle Hernandez of the Nevada Independent.

Thank you for your time.

Good to be here