More than 100 people packed a Blue Island District 130 board meeting Tuesday, including many teachers across the district’s 12 schools, to raise concerns about conditions following the dismissal of 31 custodial staff.
The school board voted Aug. 18 to outsource its custodial positions, laying off all custodians in the process, according to Service Employees International Union Local 73. Six maintenance staff were retained, expected to handle the work until custodians through a new company began Sept. 7.
Since then, teachers, staff and students have reported worsening conditions within District 130 schools, including filthy bathrooms and floors, rodent and insect infestations, and mold in a middle school locker room.
Community members who spoke Tuesday expressed support for the laid-off custodians, who clashed with district leadership as they worked to negotiate a union contract last year.
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Among the union’s main concerns was a hostile work environment for custodians and maintenance workers that members say included racial discrimination, with administrative officials prohibiting workers from speaking any language other than English during disciplinary hearings and prohibiting use of interpreters.
Melanie Velasquez, a seventh grader at Kerr Middle School, apologized for not previously recognizing the hard work that goes into being a custodian.
“They are very kind and respectful and never complain about their job, even when they clean up throw-ups, floors, toilet, trash and more,” Melanie said, adding she asked her mom to volunteer to help clean in their absence. “With all due respect, I don’t see none of the board cleaning my school.”
Melanie’s mom, Jessica Velasquez, said the custodians were always happy to go out of their way to do extra work for Parent-Teacher Organization events and other student activities, saying they were happy to do what they could to keep students off the streets.
She said worries about illness spreading at school have magnified, with word going around that mice and cockroaches were sighted.
“When the kids start school, everybody starts getting sick,” Velasquez said. “Now that school has started, there’s just going to be more.”
Blue Island Educational Association President Sherri Roozee-Sera said since the board voted to lay off its custodians, the teachers, principals and other staff “have had to step up and basically be custodians, along with doing their regular work.”
“Though there was supposed to be a plan, the reality is there really wasn’t a plan, because the district never had the staffing to be able to properly clean and care for 12 buildings,” said Roozee-Sera, a physical education teacher at Paul Revere Primary School.
While District 130 Board President Nicole Martinez and Vice President Jennifer McGinnis apologized for the issues seen within schools, they said many of them predate custodial layoffs. Martinez said the board knew there would be a challenge with the transition, but said the background check process for custodians is taking longer than expected.
“In the meantime, our teachers, principals, maintenance workers and other staff have gone above and beyond to fill the gaps,” Martinez said. “We are in this situation because serious issues, service issues with our previous provider led to worsening conditions in our school and the need for a change.”
“Our schools were gross and dirty before this,” McGinnis said.
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Roozee-Sera responded to the board members’ statements when called on to deliver a report on behalf of the teacher’s union, pleading with them to address what has become “a crisis situation.”
“I am very disheartened to continue with this cleaning service, as a teacher in a building that has never seen conditions like we are seeing, as so many teachers in this room are seeing,” she said. “There comes a time when things are happening that are wrong that we have to say something, and this is that time.”