South Allegheny teachers, who have been working without a contract since July, authorized their negotiating team to call a strike as necessary Thursday, but any work stoppage is at least a month away, a union official said.

The school district had no immediate response.

The South Allegheny Education Association has agreed to begin the fact-finding process, in which a neutral third party will listen to the union and the school board and then come up with a proposed contract, said Butch Santicola, spokesman for the Pennsylvania State Education Association.

If both sides vote to accept the proposal, it becomes the new contract. If either side rejects it, the contract is made public, and a second vote is held.

If either side rejects the contract in the second vote, the negotiating team could then call a strike, Santicola said. “That (process) generally takes about 40 days,” he added.

The South Allegheny Education Association represents 131 teachers. Santicola said 121 teachers attended Thursday’s meeting, and all but two voted for the strike authorization.

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