California deaf school workers can’t afford housing. They want unprecedented pay raises
Mel Vezina wishes they didn’t have to live nearly 115 miles away from their work. They wish they didn’t have to choose between a four-hour round-trip commute every day and sleeping overnight in their car during the week, which they’ve been doing for the last 10 years.
But, as a residence life counselor at California’s state-funded School for the Deaf in Fremont, Vezina says they can’t afford to live near their work on their state salary, which amounts to about $3,500 a month in take-home pay.
“I love what I do,” Vezina said in American Sign Language. “I can’t imagine working anywhere else, because the school is such a wonderful school.”
At the same time, Vezina says they’re mentally exhausted and frustrated. It’s hard to be away from their family all week, working 2:45 p.m. until midnight as a “dorm parent” for students. When they do come home, to Rancho Cordova, most of their time goes toward household chores.
On top of that, the staff at the school is dwindling as people take higher paying jobs or move to areas where the cost of living is cheaper. That means Vezina and others are expected to help fill the gaps by working longer hours or pulling overnight shifts.
“I’m just worn out,” Vezina said. “It’s just getting harder and harder every year.”
CSD Fremont is the only Northern California school where deaf students can fully immerse themselves in Deaf culture and language. Still, the school’s enrollment has declined significantly in the last seven to eight years, according to staff, and turnover has been high.
Without a bump in pay and a commitment to boosting student enrollment, Vezina and others worry that the school could be forced to cut back on services and classes – a tremendous loss for the Deaf community, which has long had to fight for respect and equal access to education.
Teachers, counselors and other employees at CSD Fremont are just a few of the nearly 100,000 state workers whose union, Service Employees International Union Local 1000, is currently bargaining with the state for significant wage increases. The union has asked for an unprecedented 30% raise over the life of its next three-year contract, with special adjustments for specific job classifications. Its current deal expires at the end of this week, on Friday.
So far, the union says the state has responded with an “insulting” offer of 2% raises each year.
Vezina knows that many of their students come from difficult home situations. Their own family didn’t use much sign language when they were growing up, and they struggled with loneliness. Being able to provide support for deaf students and help them find their way in the world is why Vezina continues to make the commute and spend nights in their van.
“It’s so fulfilling,” Vezina said. “But it’s exhausting. It’s hard.”
CSD Fremont as ‘a beacon of light’
The School for the Deaf has served as a lifeline and a place of belonging for multiple generations of deaf students and families.
In the mid-1970s, under the direction of superintendent Henry Klopping, the school adopted a “bilingual and bicultural” approach to teaching, with instructors signing in American Sign Language as well as speaking in English. At the time, the approach was considered progressive and cutting edge. Sign language was largely discouraged in both mainstream and deaf schools before then, and children were expected to learn by reading lips.
“The reputation that we had was something that went far beyond our borders,” Klopping said. “The school did an outstanding job of educating its students.”
Deaf scholars and educators from around the world have called CSD Fremont a “shining light” and a “model” for Deaf education. They point to the school’s bilingual model of instruction and also praising the school’s commitment to employing deaf people as administrators and instructors.
Paddy Ladd, a deaf scholar and activist who coined the identity term “Deafhood,” has praised CSD Fremont extensively in his books on Deaf education.
“It is no exaggeration to say that this is a model school, not only for the US, but literally for the world,” Ladd wrote in a May letter in support of CSD Fremont. “(P)eople come from across the planet to see how the highest-quality Deaf education can be made possible.”
Stanley Matsumoto, a graduate of CSD Fremont who now works on staff as a residence life counselor, credits the school’s immersive environment with giving him the tools to develop his own identity as a deaf person.
Before he started attending CSD Fremont at age 10, Matsumoto struggled to learn alongside hearing students in traditional schools. At home, Matsumoto was the only deaf person in his household and his family didn’t know sign language. It wasn’t until he came to CSD Fremont that he learned how to communicate and express himself through language.
“There were like 600 students there, and it was amazing to see so much sign language,” Matsumoto told The Bee in American Sign Language.
“Everybody was signing,” he added. “It was wonderful learning about the Deaf culture.”
For deaf people, a deaf school plays a similar role as ethnic neighborhoods do for immigrant families, Matsumoto said. His own family immigrated to San Francisco from China, and they felt most at home in Chinatown around other Chinese people. Similarly, he felt most comfortable when surrounded by Deaf culture at CSD Fremont.
And, by developing his sign language skills, he finally had a way to communicate with the world.
High cost of living makes recruitment challenging
Since the School for the Deaf relocated to Fremont in 1980, property values and incomes in the area have skyrocketed.
When the new location was chosen, Fremont at the time was a relatively small city with a reasonable cost of living. Fewer than 45,000 households lived there, according to census data, and the median household income was just under $100,000 in today’s dollars.
But following the boom of Silicon Valley in the late 1980s, development took off in the area around the school and sent real estate prices, and the area’s median income, soaring.
Today, close to 224,000 people call Fremont home, and the median household income is about $154,000, according to the most recent census data. The median value of a home is about $1.1 million.
“The cost of living in the Bay Area is so high, and it’s extremely hard to recruit,” said former superintendent Klopping, who retired in 2011. “It was hard when I was there, but it’s gotten even more difficult now.”
Ty Kovacs, a teacher and campus steward for SEIU Local 1000, said many potential hires have declined their offers after learning how much they’d be paid and Fremont’s high cost of living. According to union data, the school has experienced turnover in 272 different positions since 2016, and 58 of those roles have been teachers. The school is currently short five nighttime counselors, who stay with and assist the children overnight, Kovacs said.
“Many staff in their 50s stayed to keep the ship running strong,” Kovacs wrote in an email to The Bee. Union data shows that 175 employees are currently eligible for retirement.
Vezina, who works as an afternoon counselor and stays in their car overnight during the week, says they rotate with other counselors to make up for the vacant night counselor roles.
Klopping and others have pointed out that the cost of living in Riverside, home to another School for the Deaf campus, is much lower than in Fremont. Employees at the Fremont campus earn marginally more due to a monthly recruitment and retention bonus of $200 for student life staff and $700 for teachers.
Still, the large difference in housing costs dwarf the additional pay. The median home value in Fremont of $1.1 million is more than double that of the $420,000 in Riverside, census data show. And Fremont’s median gross monthly rent is 65% higher – about $2,600 compared to $1,600 in Riverside.
“The state needs to understand that the cost of living issue is causing mental health problems with our staff,” said Kovacs, a graduate of the school himself. “And if the school doesn’t run well, then we are going to lose that culture and community.”
Staff and scholars alike worry that if cost-of-living concerns aren’t addressed, then the school might have to cut back on classes and services. Student enrollment has declined significantly since people like Kovacs and Matsumoto were students. According to the California Department of Education, enrollment dropped by more than 100 students between 2000 and 2022. Kovacs’ latest count tallied only 337 students enrolled at the school in 2023.
Ladd, formerly a professor of Deaf Studies at the University of Bristol, England, cautioned California officials that the school has reached a “tipping point,” with the number of students dwindling, and inaction could result in the loss of a historic institution.
“(T)his next round of funding will be crucial in determining its future,” Ladd wrote. “If the situation cannot be changed, then by the end of that 3-year funding budget, the situation may well be irretrievable.”
Stanley Matsumoto and his wife, Haruna Matsumoto, live with their two children in Livermore – about an hour to 90 minutes away from the school. Haruna, who is deaf, works at CSD Fremont in the human resources department. Together, the couple brings home about $6,600 a month after taxes.
“The deaf school is really our second home, to be honest,” said Haruna Matsumoto in American Sign Language. “That’s kind of where we’ve found our happy place and our communication skills.”
To help make ends meet, the family rents out one of their three bedrooms to a tenant, and all of them share a single bathroom. Stanley Matsumoto also works part-time at REI some nights after his shift at the school. He’ll commute an hour to Fremont, work with students in the dorms from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., then drive home to work from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. at the store.
“We just really need some help,” Haruna said. “We’re screaming for help now, at this point.”
The California Department of Education has said it is aware of the housing affordability issue in the Bay Area and are working on potential solutions. A bill that would’ve created an affordable housing program for state school employees stalled in the Assembly earlier this year after it failed to receive a committee vote, though the department plans to resurrect it again next year. A second bill, which would’ve required the state to increase future funding for the state’s special schools and diagnostic centers, didn’t survive the Assembly Appropriations Committee’s suspense file.
“We support our employees,” said Nancy Hlibok Amann, who leads the state special schools and services division within the department, in American Sign Language. “We want the best for everyone.”
Hlibok Amann said she’s engaged in preliminary conversations with apartment complexes across the street from the Fremont campus to see if there’s a possibility of making units available at affordable rates for some of the school’s employees. The talks are in early stages, she said, but she’s hopeful by early next year they might be able to secure up to 10 units for staff members.
“The housing issue is everywhere in the state of California,” Hlibok Amann said. “It’s not something that’s going to happen overnight.”
‘Too far in’ to give up now
Vezina has sometimes considered leaving CSD Fremont to find another job — one that’s closer to where they live in Sacramento County, or one outside of California entirely. But after giving more than 12 years of service to the school and the state, they feel like they can’t abandon their students, nor their benefits and pension.
“I’m too far in right now to leave and go find another job,” Vezina said.
For now, their hopes lie with SEIU Local 1000 and the bargaining team. They hope the union can secure higher pay, and also an agreement for the school to house staff on or near campus for affordable prices. And they hope leaders in state government hear their story and take action.
“I’m being vulnerable, and it’s not a pleasant experience — it’s kind of embarrassing — but I’m not doing this for me,” Vezina said. “I’m doing this to help others.”
