Showing posts with label ICE/UFT. Show all posts
Showing posts with label ICE/UFT. Show all posts

Wednesday, February 7, 2024

JAMES ETERNO - We've lost a Giant - Tributes role in

Along with all the other things James was about, he was the best human being one can be... many comments

Even within the UFT leadership and Unity Caucus, James always received the utmost respect. There will be a moment of silence for James at today's Delegate Assembly. 



I’m still trying to find the words to express the impact of James Eterno's passing yesterday when his giant heart gave out after being hospitalized due to a devastating stroke last May, from which he never recovered. Since then and the stilling of his work on the ICE blog I have lost some of my enthusiasm for the work we were doing. James was part of a small chat group for years where we shared comments and phone calls almost every day. Not having his influence and advice has left a big hole.

 

Wednesday, February 7, 2024

When I saw a call to the group coming in from James on April 29, I was in a diner having breakfast with Arthur Goldstein. "That's James calling, probably to push me to call an ICE meeting." 

It was Camille to let us know James had had a stroke the day before. 

When I saw Camille calling yesterday at 3PM, I dreaded picking it up, thinking the worst. James died a few hours before and Camille was being driven to pick up their daughter at school. Camille always maintained hope James would regain enough faculties to be able to come home where the environment would speed his recovery. She reported that at times he tried to speak. He had been moved from the hospital to the nursing home on Monday and died Tuesday afternoon. Beyond the family, the entire educational community has been devastated. Texts have been coming in all morning from admirers.

Michael Fiorillo and I went to see him in the hospital a few weeks ago and despite the respirator and all the wires hooked up his color was good and his face looked like it always had. He looked at us a few times but we couldn't be sure if he heard us. There was always hope he would come out of it at some point. Camille had hoped he would get well enough to go home. Hospitals and nursing homes can be dangerous due to infections and that seems to have done him in.

When Mike Schirtzer and I visited during the summer, James' pulse jumped when we talked union politics, especially about the healthcare issue. Six of us went to see him as a group at one point and we told him all about the struggles in the UFT. Camille felt he was hearing us.

While we know how devastating this news is to the family, it is equally devastating to the union movement and the UFT, especially the opposition. James was especially important in the 2022 United For Change UFT election campaign. In fact, I'm not sure the opposition would have come together if not for him and Camille, who was our presidential candidate. Remember, James was the ICE/TJC presidential candidate in 2010, Mulgrew's first election. The only husband/wife team to run for UFT president. They were a team - the golden couple of the UFT for many of us. James also was the HS VP candidate in the 2016 election and received the most high school votes. Before they changed the constitution in 1994, James would have been on the AdCom - and what a difference that would have made.

James had been bugging me in the month before his stroke to have an in person ICE meeting and I was intending to call one in May. I was so thrown for a loop (notice how little blogging I've done since), it took me until December 27 to have an ICE meeting because I couldn't imagine one without James. Camille and James often schlepped into the city on Fridays after school, sometimes with the kids, to attend ICE meetings, which James at times termed "Norm Seminars" since I talked so much.

I'm calling another ICE meeting during the Feb. break where those who show up can reminisce about the impact James had. 

After ICE joined with TJC in 2012 to form MORE in 2012, James insisted on keeping ICE alive though meetings and the influential ICE blog which he took over from Jeff Kaufman around 2008. James never felt quite at home in MORE and liked the family type atmosphere in ICE. When a segment of MORE asked the ICE people to leave, James often said "I told you so."

To let ICE die after James put so much effort into it would besmirch his memory and all the hard work he did. But without the daily blogging James did, finding a role for ICE in the context of the current opposition and without James' counsel will not be easy.

While I knew James when he was with New Action from 1995-2003, we became closer when ICE was founded in 2003 and James, who was a UFT Exed Bd member since 1995, ran on the ICE-PAC/TJC* slate in 2004 and was elected, along with Jeff Kaufman and Barbara Kaplan-Halpert (who died not long ago). Thus James served for a dozen years on the UFT Exec Bd, a consistent voice for those opposing Unity policy. He and Jeff were a dynamic duo. 

*TJC and ICE ran completely separate slates except for the high schools where each group cross-endorsed 3 HS candidates and won.

With the retiree chapter election coming, Retiree Advocate had expected James to play a major role during the election and especially if we win, as a member of the RTC Exec Bd. We thought of running him as a delegate to honor him and leave a blank seat but decided it would not be appropriate. But if we do win, it will be so sad him not being there with us after so many decades of struggle with him.

There's no way for me to describe my 25-year relationship with James, which was at times contentious, including some yelling. But no disagreement ever stuck beyond a few minutes. In the past few years we had a running joke about how we were both lunatics for putting so much time into union activities after we retired. We were addicted to the union action, though he didn't always have as much fun as I did. When things for the opposition were at their bleakest and we thought of an alternative to our addiction, we would just say, "Time to go play some gold." Sometimes after a particular trying time he would call and just say "Golf?" By the way, neither of us could play golf. If I ever do get over my UFT drug habit, without James this may be sooner than later,  and go play golf, I will think of not having James there with me.

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One of many memories: Our NYSUT adventure - https://youtu.be/AbkqXmDz62Y?si=UDe0V_FJMvkf_wMY

Powerful speeches in the glory days of MORE. (One day I will tell the entire story in my memoirs.


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Jeff Kaufman posted on the ICE blog:

In Loving Memory of James Eterno

It is with a heavy heart that we announce the passing of our dear friend and colleague, James Eterno, on February 6, 2024. James was a cherished member of our community, and his absence will be deeply felt.

James’ life was marked by his unwavering dedication to education and his tireless advocacy for teachers and students alike. His contributions to the ICE-UFT blog have been invaluable, and his insights and wisdom will be sorely missed.

In honor of James’ memory, we would like to invite all who knew him to share their anecdotes and memories of James. Whether it’s a story that makes you smile, a lesson he taught you, or simply a sentiment about what James meant to you, we welcome your contributions.

Please submit your anecdotes and memories to Jeff Kaufman at JeffBKaufman@gmail.com. Jeff will be compiling these tributes and sharing them on the ICE-UFT blog, as a testament to the remarkable impact James had on all of us.

In these difficult times, let us come together to remember James, to celebrate his life, and to carry forward the values and principles he held dear.

Thank you for your contributions. Your words will help keep James’ spirit alive in our hearts and in our community.

With deepest sympathy,

Jeff Kaufman

Lydia Howrilka, who has been like a rock to the family, already has posted: My memories of James Eterno

Wednesday, July 28, 2021

UFT Elections (Part 2): ICE/UFT meeting calls for United Slate for UFT elections, addresses back to school safety and abusive principals

We ... call on all caucuses and UFT members opposed to one party ruling Unity Caucus to come together now when there is common cause at UFT district/borough level Chapter Leader meetings, Delegate Assemblies, Executive Board meetings and to secure a better contract for all members during the upcoming negotiations....

At the meeting, the united front was not even the main item on the agenda. Right now, of greater importance was back to school safety issues were front and center, as was the consistent problem of how to support teachers facing dictator principals.

It's ALIVE! ICE/UFT passed a reso calling for a united front in the spring 2022 UFT elections (see reso below). See Part 1 of my series for why I supported this reso - UFT Elections (Part 1) - Historical Analysis - Comparing the 2016 success and the 2019 disaster

 I was asked to call a zoom meeting of the Independent Community of Educators and I admit I did so reluctantly, stamping my foot and declaring, "I ain't meeting without getting my rice pudding in person." 

OK. So I asked for RSVPs and got about three, including from an island in Greece and one from an ICEer in Mexico City. "This noon-time meeting will be a shorty," I figured, and I could go back to the beach. If a tree falls at a meeting and no one was there, did the tree really fall? 

Boy, was I surprised when 20 people showed up, including people from different groups in the UFT. It's the first time I saw young people at an ICE meeting, where there is no membership required, since I was young myself. Actually, ICE has no membership. Show up and you're in. We've had people eating at other tables in the diner become ICEers by being in the same space - or by ordering rice pudding.

If so many people emerge in the middle of a hot summer day to attend a meeting, ICE/UFT still lives.

July 28, 2021 - Good morning

The Independent Community of Educators emerged out of dormancy and came to life yesterday with its first zoom meeting ever, a meeting attended by over 20 people, some for the first time. Included were actual youngish in-service UFT members, including newly elected chapter leaders and delegates who made up the majority of attendees. Many of us original ICEers had come to think of us as a retiree group and had been putting our energy into Retiree Advocate Caucus where we work with people from New Action and former MOREs. ICE last met in person (usually no more than a dozen people) at our fave rice-pudding diner years ago. Since the faction in control of MORE/UFT Caucus had formally asked ICE, a founding caucus of MORE, to leave and began suspending individuals, some ICEers had pulled back from UFT activities - me included.

ICE/UFT - The Uncaucus
People in the ICE community have been pressuring me to call a meeting for months. I wasn't sure what ICE really was. The public face of ICE is the James Eterno and the ICE blog. We have an expanding listserve with many veteran UFT activists and a few new people. We still have money in the bank. Founded in 2003 and running as a caucus in the 2004, 07, 10 UFT elections, ICE merged with TJC and independents to form MORE in 2012, aiming at the 2013 elections. While TJC disbanded, ICE continued to meet to discuss important issues that were being given short shrift in the rigidly run MORE. 
 
The idea of an uncaucus --  being active in UFT issues but not formally running as a caucus in elections - was born in ICE. Yesterday's resolution fits into the uncaucus idea - calling on all non-Unity UFT caucuses and the non-caucused independents to join together for the 2022 spring UFT elections.

Hail the Eternos
Enormous credit goes to James Eterno for keeping the ICE brand going with the ICE blog, which has developed an enormous following due to his diligence in being the only space for people to go for up-to-date reporting on the UFT. But as we saw yesterday at the meeting, James and Camille Eterno have an enormous number of contacts in schools throughout Queens, even elementary schools. James and Camille have been advising many teachers seeking help and have also helped advise those running in recent UFT chapter elections. Some of them were at the meeting.

The resolution passed yesterday to me is a no brainer - as I pointed out - UFT Elections (Part 1) - Historical Analysis - Comparing the 2016 success and the 2019 disaster.

The reso was not just about UFT elections every three years but calls on all groups to start cooperating on many fronts, including the delegate assembly and district meetings where we begin to make demands and not just sit there and listen to a Unity Caucus presentation. And of course at the Ex Bd if a unified slate should win seats - and the only way is with a united front. We've been seeing some cooperation around a few issues, especially the move of retirees out of formal public Medicare and into privatized Medicare Advantage plans. In service members will be getting the same treatment, or non-treatment very soon. Some of us have been floating an idea for a big demo in front of 52 Broadway before the Jan. 1 implementation.

I have some issues to still raise and will do so in parts 3, 4--infinity and at the next ICE meeting.

If UFT elections are rigged, What's the point in running? Why not boycott? 

If there is no united front, what do we as ICE do? 

Someone suggested we recaucus and run another slate like we did in 2004 when we were not happy with the other groups.  

Another idea is to try to unite all groups that could be united and support that group. 

Or just sit it all out and watch with amusement.

RESOLUTION FOR A UNITED SLATE IN THE 2022  UFT UNION-WIDE 2022 

As passed unanimously by the Independent Community Educators at our meeting of July 27th, 2021


Whereas The UFT Leadership Unity Caucus, the ruling one party system that has suppressed democracy and stifled member participation under a 60-year hegemonic, unilateral control of the UFT, has failed the membership on a number of issues and can only be seriously challenged by a united opposition,


Be it Resolved: The Independent Community of Educators urges all UFT opposition caucuses and non-affiliated independents within the UFT to come together and form a full and united slate to run against the Unity Caucus in the 2022 United Federation of Teachers union-wide elections.


The Covid 19 pandemic, with its challenges and life and death consequences for our union family, has forged new relationships between opposition caucuses, groups and independent union members within the United Federation of Teachers.


A growing consensus and collective spirit towards greater cooperation has blossomed among those opposed to the Unity leadership and have found common cause in fighting for a better union and safer schools during the pandemic.


This cooperation has been evident in seeking to mutually coordinate around vital issues for rank and file members fighting against the privatization of Medicare for our senior retirees; and mobilizing to organize and cooperate within the Delegate Assembly for common agendas.


It is our fundamental belief that only a full and United Slate in the 2022 UFT union-wide election can challenge the ruling one party system that has suppressed democracy and stifled member participation under the 60 year hegemonic, unilateral rule of the Unity Caucus.


This United Slate will be formed by UFT members who believe a better, democratic union is not only necessary, but presently possible. Our union leadership must energetically and responsively involve, engage, and educate its members at all times. Together we can fight for this!


The goal of the United Slate would be to challenge the Unity Caucus in order to ensure they are  responsive and transparent to our members. We will use the election as a platform to educate all union members about the dangers of an increasingly isolated leadership that makes decisions for us, not with us. If we were to win seats on the Executive Board, which historically speaking is very possible, we would work in concert to give voice to members of our union, bring member’s issues to the leaders that they have otherwise chosen to ignore, and speak truth to power. 


The members of Independent Community of Educators, which in the past has won seats on the UFT Executive Board in coalition with other groups and as founding members of MORE, will assist in providing logistical support for the union-wide elections through completing petitioning efforts, canvassing, electoral analysis, media promotion and distribution.


We also call on all caucuses and UFT members opposed to one party ruling Unity Caucus to come together now when there is common cause at UFT district/borough level Chapter Leader meetings, Delegate Assemblies, Executive Board meetings and to secure a better contract for all members during the upcoming negotiations. 


We need not and can not work together on every one of our platform/program points. There are political differences amongst the groups, but on issues where we find ourselves under the same banner, and we know there are many times when this will be and has been the case, we ought to find the means to coordinate for the betterment of our union, its members and the families we serve. 


 

Monday, July 26, 2021

UFT Elections (Part 1) - Historical Analysis - Comparing the 2016 success and the 2019 disaster

UFT Slate Ballot 2016                   
    UNITY
    MORE/New Action  
 
UFT Slate Ballot 2019
    UNITY
    Solidarity
    MORE
    New Action
The real losers in all of this Norm is the active teacher base... Comment on Ed Notes 2019 UFT election report, May 23, 2019
As we approach another UFT general election cycle in the spring of 2022, I've been looking back at the various coalitions and where I've stood. 

I've always been ambivalent about the election process, though until the last election in 2019, I had thrown myself deeply into the battle since 2004. A group of independents, unhappy with the then state of the caucuses, formed a new caucus, ICE/UFT, specifically to run in that election, mainly because the predominant caucus, New Action, had made a deal with Randi that enraged the other anti-Unity forces. TJC was already out there but many felt they were a closed box, undemocratic and dominated by a few voices with a narrow agenda. People were upset at both TJC and NA.

The creation of a new caucus went against my normal grain. When I began Education Notes in 1997 I tried to make it a unifying force and in fact soon after the 2001 UFT elections I called a meeting of all interest groups and independents in the UFT to unite for the next elections, but also to begin working together instead of in separate silos inside the UFT, especially at Delegate Assemblies. After an almost fist fight at the second meeting I have up and instead began to drift toward bringing people together around some of the principle issues I was addressing in Ed Notes, which led to the formation of ICE a few years later.

Generally I have always been in favor of caucuses uniting, either permanently as in 1995, when New Action emerge out of the merger of New Directions and Teachers Action Caucus and in 2012 when ICE and Teachers for a Just Contract merged into MORE (along with other groups). 

At the time, MORE looked like it could unite most of the anti-Unity forces and form one umbrella opposition caucus - a big tent. Unfortunately, within a few short years divisions opened up and the alliance of ICE and TJC proved to have weak bonds -- MORE is now controlled by many of the original TJCC people while ICE is out in the cold.

I've taken various positions regarding UFT elections in 2010, 2013, 2016, 2019, at times advocating a boycott and using the election as a means to pointing out how it is rigged in Unity's favor. But few agreed with me, their juices running at the very thought of an election, even if the process occupies months of time where organizing actually doesn't take place -- I base this on the outcomes of previous elections where some people not in the opposition literati get active briefly with the expectation we could win and then when the reality of seeing Mulgrew get 80-85% of the vote, fade into the woodwork.

I changed my mind in 2016 when New Action left its alliance with Unity and joined with MORE in an election coalition and we knew we could win the 7 high school seats. And we did win those seats. Barely, but we won. I remember arguing with some of the resisters in MORE who liked to run only if they wouldn't win anything that winning even 7% of the Ex Bd offered hope to the anti-Unity rank and file. And our electeds did yeoman duty - holding open pre-ex bd meetings and bringing a wide range of  people to advocate for their causes at the meetings.

That model of winning even 7% of the Ex Bd - as opposed to the outcome of 2019 where Unity won 100% - is a prime motivating factor in an attempt to bring all groups together to win those seats -- and hopefully some others in the middle and elementary schools. If all three teacher divisions were won, that would be 23% of the Ex Bd.

Outside the internal literati of the UFT, the average UFT member doesn't have much of a clue as to the differences between the various caucuses -- or even give a much of a shit. Fundamentally they often ask, "Why can't you guys get together? You are asking us to vote for you instead of Unity and even small groups like you can't come together?" Don't forget, 70% of UFT members don't vote, even higher in the teacher divisions. A non-vote is in essence a rejection of Unity and the opposition. And I believe that multiple caucuses running against Unity suppresses the vote further.

In 2019, after a successful 2016 campaign by a coalition of MORE and New Action, MORE inexplicably decided to break that alliance and run a lone campaign that was designed to purposely NOT win anything. 

In my last months in MORE I was taking part in these debates and offered two options -- either run as a united front with other caucuses and indepenents so voters face a clearly defined choice between Unity and an opposition, or don't run at all and use the election to focus on issues. Both ideas were rejected and eventually I was forced out of MORE for writing about the debate.

The outcome was a disaster from the point of electoral politics as MORE finished third behind Solidarity which had not even been able to have enough candidates to get rccognized as a slate in 2016. 

A big question on the minds of the usual suspects thinking ahead to the 2022 elections is will MORE make the same mistake, a mistake that the caucus has not been open about -- or even informed its many new members, some of whom have been in touch asking what happened?

In 2016 MORE/New Action had about 10,600 votes and a non-slate candidate for president had 1400. That was 12,000 votes against Unity, a number matching some of the better outcomes for the opposition over history. 

The total vote of three opposition caucuses running independently in 2019 was less than 7,000. How did such a disastrous outcome occur over a 3 year period? See theEd Notes Election report

The only way to challenge Unity is to have one slate go head to head, not a smorgasbord of opposition groups that only confuse the membership.

I've been hearing from people who listened to my discussion with Leo Casey and Daniel Alicea of UFT history in its early decades on the "Talk Out of School" WBAI broadcast last Saturday. 

Some have pointed to our not getting to the issue of opposition groups in the union that were opposed to Unity Caucus since 1962. And there have been quite a few such groups over the decades. I've helped found three or four (depending on how you classify them) since the 70s.

Having a clean choice of Unity vs one opposition is important for the average, non-involved in UFT internal politics voter - or non-voter.

UFT Slate Ballot 2016                   
    UNITY
    MORE/New Action                        
*Solidarity did not have the required 40 to be listed as a slate, but did run as individuals.  
 
Outcome: MORE/NA received almost 11,000 votes and the Solidarity presidential candidate 1400 votes. MORE/NA also won the 7 high school Ex Bd. seats
 
UFT Slate Ballot 2019
    UNITY
    Solidarity
    MORE
    New Action                                                                                              

Outcome: No ex bd seats - total of all opposition groups less than 8000.

The 2019 UFT election with 3 opposition slates on the ballot was an absolute disaster to have slid back so far after the gains of 2016.

So with elections coming up next year, here we are with the same situation,

I have examined my thinking over the years and firmly believe that I and many of my colleagues from back to the early 70s have tried to bring the opposition forces together for UFT elections and in other areas, like the Delegate Assembly.

The caucus system has often interfered with thee goals. Every small pond must have its big cheeses. But let's agree that there will always be one of more opposition caucus in the UFT, as there has been since the 1960s. The most successful outcomes have come when caucuses came together for general elections -- and of course I don't mean actually winning the election since Unity has had control since the inception of the UFT in 1960 - but in vote totals and winning some seats on the Ex Bd.

One of the most successful coming together elections was in 1981 when three competing caucuses - New Directions (ND), Teachers Action Caucus (TAC), Coalition of School Workers (CSW) - plus independents -  joined to form New Action Coalition - taking one word from the name of each caucus. (In 1995 New Directions and TAC merged to form the current New Action.) We signed up a full slate of 800 people to run - see photo below. And we held large petition signing events attended by hundreds who also picked up literature to distribute in their schools. That election coalition lasted though the 90s and won the high school VP position in 1985 and high school and middle school ex bd seats in the 90s - in fact has continuously won the high schools on the whole -- until 2019.

We truly all didn't get along very well but put aside the rancor of the 70s and even if it took years, this coalition began to make some headway, culminating in winning the HS VEEP in 1985 and 13 Ex Bd seats in 1991.

Many of us believe we are in a unique moment in UFT history, with signs there may be some slippage in the retiree vote and Unity fumbling on a host of issues, putting the high school and middle school ex bd seats in play. And some signs of elementary school disaffection. 

With so many teachers not voting in the past, a GOTV campaign using the many retirees who have become activated and working through the Retiree Advocate group, which itself has cross caucus people from New Action, ICE, a few former MOREs and independents might offer a change to make a dent in Unity, even if winning the whole thing may not be in the cards.

Election lit, 1981: