Los Angeles is an outlier among the many nation’s greatest cities: In contrast to the District of Columbia, Chicago and New York, its mayor doesn’t management the colleges.

Traditionally suspicious of energy, Los Angeles way back restricted Metropolis Corridor’s authority over public training and conferred energy on an unbiased faculty board. The clout of town, the nation’s second largest, additionally is restricted by the sheer measurement of the Los Angeles Unified College District, which sprawls over some 700 sq. miles and serves college students who stay in additional than two dozen different municipalities.

That is the panorama confronting Karen Bass, who turned the mayor of Los Angeles in December, as she faces a three-day strike of 30,000 faculty help employees in what quantities to the primary main check of her administration. The workers are looking for a 30 % pay enhance as residing prices soar in Southern California; union leaders say their members are paid not far more than the minimal wage.

Up to now, Ms. Bass has had a notably low public profile throughout the colleges strike, particularly compared with the mayor of Chicago, Lori Lightfoot, who was entrance and heart in 2019 and 2022 throughout work stoppages there, or the mayor of Washington, D.C., Muriel Bowser, when faculty unions within the district negotiated a brand new contract final 12 months. In Los Angeles, the mayor sometimes has little energy past utilizing the bully pulpit or providing to dealer an settlement at Metropolis Corridor.

In an interview on Tuesday, the primary day of the strike, Ms. Bass mentioned she was not avoiding the labor combat, however declined to enter element. She is a former congresswoman and state legislative chief who has an extended historical past of behind-the-scenes diplomacy, notably in disputes between fellow Democrats.

“I can say that I’ve been deeply concerned with all events,” she mentioned. “However it will not be productive to have a press convention about it. My focus is on a profitable decision.”

Ms. Bass publicly has shunned taking sides, regardless that she obtained help in her mayoral election from the union that represents the employees, Service Staff Worldwide Union Native 99.

On the identical time, Gov. Gavin Newsom of California has not intervened within the labor dispute. A spokesman for Mr. Newsom mentioned the governor has no rapid plans to change into concerned within the negotiations, though he and Ms. Bass had met to debate the strike final weekend, and he’s receiving updates from each side.

The Los Angeles strike has annoyed the households of greater than 420,000 college students. However as a result of it’s restricted in length to a few days, the scenario appears to lack the sense of urgency that has accompanied open-ended walkouts, by which the prospect of extended faculty closures places rapid strain on all sides to succeed in a deal.

Darry Sragow, a longtime Democratic political guide, mentioned that politically, “there isn’t a upside” for both the governor or Ms. Bass in turning into embroiled in an emotional however time-limited labor motion “that may presumably work itself out.”