Unity Caucus to Independents: We'll Waive Loyalty Oath and Joining Unity

With UFT elections upon us, Unity Caucus leaders, well aware of UFT activists alienated by the ideologically restricted environment of the MORE Caucus, have been actively recruiting people who have a history of being critics of UFT policy.

One of the carrots they are offering is not having to sign the Unity loyalty oath which forces members of the caucus to support all policies, even if they disagree.

They are even offering deals where there is no requirement to even join the caucus. This is unprecedented and shows the influence of the Janus decision.

Why would Unity, faced with the weakest opposition in decades - meaning they will have no voice of opposition on the Ex Bd and barely one in the delegate assembly - take this step?

Unity attempts to create its own opposition
Word filtered back at the concerns within the top levels of union leadership over what happened in MORE, which was seen at the main opposition.

My analysis is that Unity has taken this step because they are nervous about the repercussions in the age of Janus in having an entire union Ex Bd with no political diversity would open them up to attacks from the anti-union forces as a sign of a one party non-democratic system.

Populism in the UFT?
I also feel that with MORE moving to the fringe, they fear the growth of a populist movement inside the UFT that may not operate under the usual opposition "rules of engagement" -sort of an old-boys and girls network of well behaved oppositionists.

Think of wild cat strike in red states and in Oakland (The Wildcat Underground: Oakland Teachers Pull Wildcat). Imagine a rogue school going off the rails! Just as Unity controls the membership, the opposition caucuses control the spigot of activism, channeling it into traditional lanes. Or even worse, an opposition movement urging people to leave the UFT and find another bargaining agent. They know MORE would never go in that direction.

You are free to speak openly
The story I am told is that Unity/UFT officials have offered a guarantee of freedom to speak openly. Maybe. I would bet that no matter what they say, not being opposed to the recent contract is a requirement.

There is no little irony that Unity on the surface is appearing to be more open than MORE. As one former MORE said to me, "If MORE is less democratic than Unity and throws people out who disagree, why not go with Unity, which at least has the toys?"

I don't necessarily agree but I can understand the thinking which was expressed to me this way:

"MORE blew up the opposition"
I see MORE having no future and none of the other caucuses either, especially in this divided election. If everyone ran together, we would have had a chance to win some positions. But now running with any of them is a losing proposition and faced with having no chance to impact union policy, why not let Unity endorse me? As long as I don't have to sign a loyalty oath and can maintain my freedom to be critical of union policy with the aim of pushing it in a progressive direction- why not?

I pushed back, feeling Unity was just using opposition people to give themselves cover as being "democratic."

"So what? MORE's blowing up the idea of a serious opposition in this election is a game changer. Point, set, match to Unity."

Probably right but I can still believe that out of the ashes of the opposition in this election, something may rise post-election, though not very likely.

I have urged people considering taking this step to run on an independent line in the UFT elections or form a mini-caucus so people who can't bear voting for Unity but who want to vote for them would have that option.

I myself am ambivalent. I have urged a boycott of what is even in the best of times for the opposition, a rigged election. I actually wanted to see Unity have all the seats and no opposition as a way to make a point.

I may write in some names or vote for all 3 caucuses, even if that invalidates the ballot, as a "vote" for a united front.

But maybe I will vote for my friends on an independent line anyway because as good old Ricky once said to Lisa, "the problems associated with a UFT election doesn't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world."

Whither/Wither The Opposition -- Past, Present and Future Tense - Part 1

Whither: to what place or state. --- old Eng.
Wither: become dry and shriveled.

What will be the state of the opposition in the UFT at the end of this election cycle in April? One of my multiple New Years resolutions is to tell the story of the on-going history of the opposition inside the UFT over the 5 decades of my own involvement. Given I am sitting out the UFT elections, I have plenty of time on my hands. The problem is, where to start?

We are a few days away from the official opening of another UFT election period and all three caucuses running on their own against Unity have been issuing calls for people to run with them and to get ready for the petition campaign which begins at the Jan. 16 Delegate Assembly. In normal times, I would be spending all my time getting ready for a 5 week long petition campaign.


For me, what a relief to be an observer and reporter in the upcoming UFT elections after having been intensely involved in five elections since the 2004 campaign.

But these are not normal times. I saw Ellen Fox the other day at the UFT Ex Bd meeting and she said for her this was the first time in 40 years she will not be involved in an election.
 
Are there so many fractures, will there be no hope for the future growth of the opposition to become an effective force to counter the 60 year old Unity Caucus machine?

It's very disappointing so see what has happened over the past 5 years after the promise of MORE when it began in 2011-12 with the support of almost all the leading voices in the opposition to Unity over the years. New Action was still aligned with Unity but over time I expected that that aging caucus would eventually join with MORE in coalition (it did in 2016) and hopefully merge. A disappointment was the defection of Portelos in 2014 when he formed his own caucus -- there were reasons he will argue. I would argue if he has remained in MORE and brought his supporters in, it would have strengthened the hands of the faction in MORE that was eventually pushed out -- the ICEUFT people. We would have had a stronger opposition to push back against the faction that gained total control of MORE with an boutique agenda aimed at a small segment of the UFT rather than the broader rank and file. That's boiling down the essential disagreements that took place in MORE over the years.


With the Los Angeles teachers in the UTLA about to strike Monday (changed from today - an unfortunate snafu due to a UTLA miscalculation) under the leadership of a progressive, left-leaning social justice caucus and with Chicago TU in the hands of a similar caucus - two of the three largest cities --- proof that such social justice like groups can succeed in winning and maintaining power -- here in NYC we find ourselves in possibly the worst situation we have faced since the New Action defection to Unity in 2003.

There is no clearer difference in the opposition in the 3 cities than to look at union elections. The NYC version of the progressive caucus - MORE - doesn't want to win anything in the election while citing the work of the groups running LA and Chi -- but never seeming to realize that those groups actually did run to win - and they did win. Which is why they can talk about striking.

If MORE had real power school level power through influence in many schools so as to raise its issues with a broad rank and file then a discussion of strike feasibility can be opened. For MORE, which weakened itself to a point where it has less influence than it has had in 5 years, to talk about strikes here in NYC, is sort of ludicrous. Instead the MORE campaigns to get the union leadership it so vilifies to do take up the MORE campaign. In Chicago and LA the caucuses themselves had enough widespread support as to take on bigger issues without relying on the union leadership. Here MORE tries to be a lobby caucus.

A fractured opposition

Now we know we can't win the whole ball of wax here but we could chip away at Unity power in the schools which is where the battle will take place. An election campaign could help build power through gathering of votes. The ballot box does count. MORE/NA getting almost 11,000 votes last time was the largest total in a long time and an opportunity. An opportunity lost.

There are consequences for this gap between the 3 big cities. Chicago and LA, have pushed back against the ed deform movement, while here in NYC we have seen the UFT be complicit with so much of ed deform, from testing to charters to teachers being held accountable based on test scores. And of course the willingness to stand by as abusive principals chop up our members. Our own union has partnered with the ed deformers all along the way. And as far as I am concerned, MORE itself has dropped the ball in many areas of push back against deformers. That there is no caucus strong enough to become a bulwark leaves us in a precarious position.

It is a sad situation where each of the three caucuses will be running their own independent campaigns with the clear outcome that none of them can win anything on their own.

In what place or state will we find the caucuses post election? Whither or just plain withered?

I see little point in running in an election where the 3 groups end up competing as much as with each other than Unity for votes and candidates and support. There is a lot of blame to go around but let's not get into those weeds at this time.

What a waste of time and energy. I urged MORE to either unite with everyone or don't run and use the opportunity to engage in their campaign outside the election process.

The leadership of MORE, which includes a bunch of people who used to run Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC), a caucus that had shrunk significantly and merged into MORE, opposed me. They argued we would miss a chance to get 2 pages in the NY Teacher - which I had pointed out are barely read by anyone. And they also said they would gain access to all the schools by running -- I pointed out they could gain access to all the schools, even by not running.

When the vote was taken, we could see a lot of doubt about running coming from the newer, younger and untenured people in MORE, which seemed to surprise the old TJC crowd. So they scaled back -- you don't have to run around the city putting stuff in the mail boxes - the very opposite of the argument they used against my position for not running.

Then came the news that even 2 people can get pages in the NY Teacher if they run -- countering their other argument for running a slate.

The only way forward post-election is some kind of united front - a big tent opposition, even if the purists have to retreat somewhat. The Unity machine is the problem and why NYC is different from Chicago and LA. I looked back to the past.

The United Front of the 80s and 90s
In recent posts I've been exploring the historical record as recorded by me over the past 22 years in Ed Notes, but especially the early hard copy publications from 1997-2005. I am reminding myself of all the issues we faced back then, with a lot to echo today's issues.
These had wider distribution I believe than the Ed Notes blog -- the Del Ass and into the schools directly in the latter years of 2002-5 after I retired.

After the 2001 election, which despite New Action winning the high school seats, showed them declining, I tried to play the role of peacemaker between all the groups (NAC, PAC, TJC) and independents by calling for meetings to form a coalition for the next election in 2004. That effort fell apart very quickly and I saw first hand the level of hostility and infighting that existed - to the extent that I, for the first time began to think that a new caucus was necessary to take on issues being ignored and thus was born ICE a few years later. The 2004 election had 3 opposition groups running, the only time other than the present.

I was reminded of the impact the mass campaigns against Unity by all elements of the opposition had in the 80s and 90s when a coalition of groups and individuals under the New Action Coalition (NAC) began to come together in the late 70-early 80s and found a united front was able to recruit a full slate of 800 people to run. And they began to chip a way at Unity power for the first time.

Now we are back to the beginning where we stood in the mid-70s.  The only way forward is for people to get some sense after the election and sit down and find a way to move toward a united front.

I made a chart with the historical links between caucuses over the decades. One day I would like to see them all culminate into one box.




Here are links to recent Ed Notes posts on this topic:

• UFT Caucus Roundup: Rallies Galore - Ed Notes, Dec...
• Breaking UFT Election News: A Gaggle of Caucuses ...
• UFT ELECTIONS ARE COMING! - 2001 edition --- If an... 
• UFT Elections: The Caucus of Goldstein and Schirtz... 

State of the Union (UFT): Elections and the Opposition Caucuses - A Continuing Saga - Part 1

Introduction

Over the next 4 months I will be doing a series of posts on the state of the union in the UFT, tapping into information about all the caucuses.

I can only hope that the folly of 3 opposition caucuses comes to an end and a strong force to stand up to Unity Caucus emerges to penetrate deeply enough into the schools to reach the 99.9% of the rank and file who don't give a crap about the caucuses.

That is what I will fight for -- bringing people, even with different political tendencies, under one banner to force change in the UFT. I am getting as much of this information on record before I lose all my faculties as a possible lesson for future activists in the UFT. Untangling this mess will take more than one blog.

Having been an active participant in the UFT opposition politics since 1970, I would say this is the weakest state of the opposition for decades, if not ever. With the opening of the UFT election season, it is time to review the disastrous state of the opposition to Unity Caucus as Unity is set to win every single seat on the Executive Board for the first time since the 1993 elections.

The opposition of three caucuses under the NAC label (since the 1981 election) had won 13 Ex Bd seats in 1991 and also won the high school VP in 1985. Now we have regressed to having 3 opposition caucuses running on their own and splitting the usual 10-12,000 opposition votes in the UFT.

So in this, and upcoming posts, let me survey the state of the UFT opposition from an historical and current perspective and why things look so dismal for the growth of the opposition in the future as we live deja vu all over again.

While I remain involved in the periphery of MORE I am non-sectarian in terms of other caucuses. I like the people in New Action and the work they do and I have tried to make peace with the people in Solidarity. I continue to organize ICEUFT meetings once a month and invite people from all caucuses to come. I think we are the one place where all groups can sit down and talk.

For the first time since the 2004 elections, there will be 3 opposition slates to choose from in the UFT elections.

• New Action
• MORE
• Solidarity 
• ICEUFT remains in operation but as a non-participant in elections.

This is the most confusion since 2004 when there were actually 4 opposition caucuses, with ICE being the newest. But At least in 2004 ICE and TJC were on the ballot in separate lines but ran a joint cross-endorsed slate for the high schools against New Action and won them (ICE ran with PAC as ICE-PAC). The last time before 2004 I can remember where there were 3 opposition slates on the ballot was - well, never. So we are in unprecedented territory here.

I've written a few blogs about the current situation with the opposition in the UFT:
UFT Election Season Opens, Does Anybody Care?
UFT Election Update: It's Beat Up MORE Time as it ...
UFT Caucus and Election History: 1962 - Present

Let me point out that none of the caucuses have more than 20-50 real members - actually less -  and in fact each are run by a small coterie of people numbering single digits who make the real decisions. Imagine -- the truly active core of all the opposition groups total 30 at most.

The saddest is MORE, which had so much promise when it was founded in 2012 and now seem proud to have shrunk in the name of unity under a single political line which it thinks will resonate with the membership. (More on MORE isolationism in future posts.)

Election petitions go out at the January 16, 2019 Del Ass and are due in mid-February. Ballots go out in mid March and are due back by April 16, with the count April 17. As a non-participant in the elections for the first time since 2001, the outcome will provide some lessons and will be fascinating to watch.

I'm urging a boycott for the election process - not only a boycott against Unity but also against an opposition that cannot come together, with each group trying to convince people that their position is best.

Why would people choose any of them? How could any of them claim they could run the union when they can't even agree with each other?

The number of non-voters will be a vote and send a message to the opposition to get their houses in order before the 2022 election.

UFT Opposition Update: Not All Peace and Harmony as 2019 Elections Approach

Representatives of MORE and New Action met recently to discuss running in the UFT election and from what we hear the coalition would not include Solidarity Caucus.

With the disagreements between some people in ICEUFT and MORE many ICEers do not want to work with MORE/NA in the election.

And there is a faction of New Action that will ONLY be involved in the election if Solidarity is included. A crucial vote in New Action will take place at the beginning of November. Some members of New Action are threatening to leave the caucus if the anti-Solidarity faction prevails.

MORE doesn't meet until October 27 and there are people in MORE supposedly who do not want to run in the election. And further, Unity has been doing some recruiting among the people they see as disaffected from all the caucuses.

Are you confused? It is time for me to do a series of blog posts (or maybe a book) about the history of the opposition and the current state of opposition politics in the UFT and why I and others have basically given up on the idea that we can affect much of a change in a UFT dominated by the too big to fail Unity Caucus. 

Is it worth the enormous amount of time and energy it takes to even run in a UFT election just to possibly win 7 high school seats on a 100 member Executive Board? Is it worth the time and energy to print up leaflets and go to a Delegate Assembly just to make a point in a sea of Unity? If I saw something bubbling up in the schools, maybe it would be worth it.

I had hopes for MORE -- until a year ago. I'll get into why I no longer have faith that MORE can ever challenge Unity in follow-up blogs over the next few months as I report on UFT internal politics.

I had envisioned MORE as a big tent caucus that everyone in an interest in beating Unity could coalesce in. That is no longer true as MORE has morphed into a group that knows it cannot win but instead wants to use its organizational initiatives to push certain ideological positions on the UFT leadership --- a lobby/pressure group of sorts.

After 6 years of life what I see are still very few schools with real activity based on MORE initiatives. In fact, I think MORE has less schools now than it did 6 years ago. And yes Virginia, size does matter in terms of ability to influence the direction of the union.

James Eterno has an optimistic report on last Friday's ICEUFT meeting attended by people connected to the various grouplings within the UFT that would be termed "the opposition."

ICEUFT Blog ICEUFT MEETING BRINGS TOGETHER MEMBERS OF ALL UFT OPPOSITION GROUPS

James says:

.... the groups seem to have much more in common in wanting a powerful union than what divides us. The leaders of the various opposition groups might not always agree on the general direction for the movement but I learned at the ICEUFT meeting that there is plenty of common ground.

James is hoping there will be opportunities to work together in the upcoming contract ratification vote and in the UFT elections in 2019.

After almost 50 years of being part of opposition politics in the UFT, I'm not as hopeful. Being optimistic is not a bad thing - as long as we have a dose of reality tossed in.

James pointed out that

ICEUFT was joined by members from New Action UFT and Solidarity caucuses. Since some of the people in ICEUFT are still part of MORE (the Movement of Rank and File Educators, all of the opposition groups to Michael Mulgrew and Randi Weingarten's Unity Caucus within the UFT were represented at the ICEUFT meeting..... http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/2018/10/iceuft-meeting-brings-together-members.html

Why are there so many grouplings and factions in the UFT?
In fact there was only a faction of New Action since there are some splits brewing over the UFT elections and who to run with. And there was only a faction of MORE present. I don't know enough about Solidarity.

When asked why the different caucuses and the non-aligned who oppose Unity Caucus in the UFT don't join together I answer with a question of my own:

Why is there a MORE, New Action, Solidarity, ICEUFT?
Given the relative small size of the number of activists, why is there more than one caucus? And not only that, why are there factions within caucuses? I guess the answer to the 2nd question explains the first. Unless a caucus - or any political group - understands that factions will exist and makes provisions for that, there will inevitably be splits and the formation of other caucuses. And when they are so weak they combine (see below for the 1995 NAC creation and the 2012 MORE creation as a result of mergers of sorts.)

And in the UFT where there is a dominant one party system of control under Unity, not having one opposition caucus under one tent spells ultimate doom for the opposition. That has proven true over the 50 years of opposition politics.

TAC
Since the first opposition caucus formed - Teachers Action Caucus (TAC) after the 1968 strike --- they were people who opposed the strike ---- there has never really been a time where there was just one big tent caucus in opposition to Unity. There were coalitions of caucuses that came together for UFT elections, but went their own way otherwise. In effect they were competing for the same few potential activists at the expense of the other caucuses.

New Directions merges with TAC
ND was a group that split off from the group I was in in the 70s -- Coalition of School Workers (CSW) which basically stopped functioning around 1981 but came back to life as ICE in 2003.

New Action came the closest to being the one opposition caucus in town when TAC merged with New Directions in 1995 after having had electoral success as a coalition of caucuses and independents in the 1991 election when they won 13 Ex Bd seats.

What is funny is that the current issues in NA run along the TAC people vs the ND people -- and ideology plays a role.  That's 23 years later and there are still latent issues.

NAC made their deal with Unity in 2003 in prep for the 2004 UFT election where they did not run a candidate for president against Randi Weingarten after she "guaranteed" them the 6 high school Ex Bd seats.


TJC and ICE
That led to the formation of two caucuses to fight against that deal --- Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC) and Independent Community of Educators (ICE-UFT). TJC had already been around for a decade but not as a caucus. The 2004 election was their first foray. We formed ICE in late 2003 because many independents did not find TJC conducive to being a truly democratic caucus but under the control of a few sectarians with a definitive ideological position that left little room for dissenting opinions.

There was immediate friction between ICE and TJC that never went away even though we won the high school seats in 2004 and ran together in 2007 and 2010.

MORE and GEM
Both caucuses were withering away with no growth - actually they shrank. Some of us in ICE saw that and organized a non-caucus -- GEM in 2009 that was non-sectarian and looked beyond internal UFT politics. GEM attracted enough people who began to think that a non-sectarian open caucus was possible.

Thus was born MORE in 2011-12 where the members of TJC and ICE came together with others. But the political tensions that had existed between ICE and TJC since 2003 never went away. And the recent splits in MORE represent those tensions where the TJC faction over the past 6 months to a year gained ascendancy and has tried to push the ICE people out. Many have abandoned MORE over the ideological differences.

So when James points to MORE people being at the ICE meeting, it is actually the ICE people still involved in MORE but at as an inconsequential level of influence.

Factions in caucuses

Unity Caucus does not seem to have factions. It runs by democratic centralism -- where even if you disagree, you must support the will of the majority or be forced out. Now some people in Unity have been talking behind the scenes that there is a faction in Unity that wants changes as a way to recruit people aligned with the divided opposition. I heard that line from Randi and crew back in the late 90s. It is just blowing smoke.

I believe that recognizing factions and holding debates on where people are divided so as to forge some common agreements is a healthy thing for a caucus and a union.

At the organizing meetings for MORE In 2011, all factions were there and sent 2 reps to each meeting. I brought up numerous times that we should explore what divided ICE and TJC as a way to resolve future issues. I was told we should only focus on what unites us not divides us. I saw this as a way to fluff over and stifle opinions.

At the very first large MORE organizing meeting in February 2012 I warned about the factions among the founders of MORE and said they must be taken into account --- ie.  make sure there is diversity of opinions and have the factions represented. But whenever you have sectarians in an organization, they will move to control the group and shut out or purge dissident voices.

Sadly, MORE has moved in that direction. The direction Unity follows, where those who disagree with policies set by the dominant faction are invited to leave the caucus - there is no longer a steering committee or any clear lines as to who are making decisions in MORE -- top down leadership so eschewed by social justice caucuses ----

As one former MORE member who left in disgust said: If MORE is going to have Unity Caucus like loyalty oaths why not just go to Unity which at least has all the toys?

Is there a way forward for the opposition and more historical context coming in future posts.

Retired Teacher Chapter Meeting Update - Unity Caucus Wins Chapter Election - DUHHH!

Wednesday, June 14, 8 AM

Today's Delegate Assembly has been postponed until next week pending the Janus decision (Lack of Decision as Yet on Janus Causes UFT to Post...).

I attended the final retired teacher chapter meeting yesterday for some crazy reason -- it was a gorgeous day.

I wanted to touch base with Lisa North, who opposed Tom Murphy for chapter leader, and Gloria Brandman who helped organize and coordinate the work we have been doing with New Action and Retiree Advocate people recently.

I also like Scott Stringer because he put Patrick Sullivan on the PEP and he was the guest speaker. Scott got a rousing reaction when he reminded us of the support the UFT gave him when he defeated Eva Moskowitz for Manhattan borough president before she began her charter career, partly I think to get revenge on the UFT. And in fact Eva and her non-unionized 50 charter schools has cost the UFT more members than Janus will.

Stringer compared the city and state pension systems. He has to consult with the unions in decision making on investments which he believes is a good thing -- compared to the state where the comptroller has sole decision making power. He said our pensions were 70% funded.

I got an important phone call related to Evil Eva and Success while Stringer was answering questions and had to go outside to take the call (more on this angle in a future post) and the meeting ended while I was on the phone.

Gloria, Lisa and I got to hang out after the meeting and talk about our own situation in ICE and MORE.

(A group of people in MORE sent a public email on the MORE Listserve asking the 3 of us to basically leave MORE or choose between ICE and MORE. As founders of ICE and MORE and having put 6 years of effort into MORE, we ignored them. Some of them have been in MORE for 10 minutes.)

One of the interesting aspects of RTC meetings is what they call "Good and Welfare" where anyone can get up and say something. Chapter leader Tom Murphy announced that G and W would be put up front of the meeting instead of the end when people are leaving. I've been asking for a feature like this for MORE Meetings but have been ignored. So it was interesting to see an RTC meeting run with more openness than the usual MORE Meetings. But more on MORE and democracy in future posts.

(A wise person who left MORE recently told me - if MORE is going to be like Unity at least Unity has the toys.)

The results of the recent UFT Retiree chapter election between the Unity slate and the Retiree Advocate/MORE/New Action slate went according to form. I wrote about the election here: VOTE Retiree Advocate: Current UFT Retiree Chapter...

19,084 - 30% - voted out of the over 60,000 ballots sent out.  Unity received 82- 83%, or 15,334 while our slate got 3405 votes -- 17-18%. This falls in line with the outcomes of general UFT elections and is a key point in why Unity will always win. There is no way to make a dent in the retiree vote.

Most important is that Unity gets to fill all 300 seats at the Delegate Assembly while we get none. In fact Unity has a lot of trouble getting 300 retirees to want to go to a DA every month and they only show in rare occassions when called out for a vote Unity is worried about.

In a proportional rep system we would get 18% of the delegates, which would be about 36 -- and our people would show. It would get me and Eterno and Gloria and Lisa and the New Action crew back in the DA -- which is why you will never see proportional rep in the UFT. Is it democratic to shut out even 17% of the voices? Those 3400 people who voted for us have their voices stilled.

Why We Choose to Leave MORE - John Giambalvo and Mike Schirtzer

Why We Choose to Leave MORE
By John Giambalvo and Mike Schirtzer

We became involved with teacher unionism after a few years of working in the schools as a result of our classroom and school-level experiences where we saw public school teachers and students being cheated out of the resources needed to provide them with an adequate education. Sparked by the general lack of response from our union, the United Federation of Teachers, our involvement led us to join the Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE), an organization that we believed would respond to concerns of UFT members by allowing them, as well as members of their school community, a space to voice concerns about our schools within the political structures of our union and the Department of Education of the City of New York.

We joined MORE during a time when few voices within the UFT represented the needs and interests of our colleagues.

We joined under the premise that our union had the potential to be the most powerful vehicle of change for teachers, students and families in New York City and beyond.

We joined MORE to create a more assertive union, where member voice was the greatest priority and, when heard, would lead it to action for the entire education community.

We joined MORE to strengthen the UFT for the betterment of the teachers, students and families we serve. We were aware that the UFT apparatus, under the almost 60 year stewardship of the Unity Caucus, had developed more than a bit of sclerosis, had not been adequately serving the needs of its members, and that that power structure needed to be challenged from the ranks. We believed MORE offered the potential to engage in that challenge.

We joined MORE and were faced with working with people with many different political backgrounds and ideologies, including some differing from our views. We made concerted efforts to function collectively with other members of MORE to improve conditions in our schools. We learned the basics of their ideologies and did our best to find middle ground. We genuinely believed we were learning to struggle together in order to improve conditions, especially for those who were affected by hurtful policies on a daily basis.

We joined MORE to prioritize making connections with teachers throughout all five boroughs; to construct and devote our work towards an agenda that would have wide appeal to a majority of members of our union who have been shut out of influence. In order to be successful MORE would have to, not only offer a way forward by leading in a new direction, but do so by being responsive and interacting with UFT members in our own schools and beyond to transform a union that operated in an absolute top-down manner.

We have been disappointed.

Unfortunately, we’ve seen that MORE has been increasingly dominated by one group with a definite pre-formed unyielding ideology. We’ve come to understand over time that these voices do not represent the needs of most of our members, or even our students or parents. MORE has devolved into an organization that uses anti-democratic and secretive methods to push the agenda of this faction and marginalize, isolate and push vocal opponents out of the caucus.

There were many opportunities for the members of MORE to analyze the results of our work in order to determine the course of the group’s direction, but it has chosen not to do so. There were meetings with varying topics, causes endorsed, social media/blog data, and the results of the 2016 UFT election which provided data on voter turnout by division and district which clearly showed a much higher turnout in the Queens high schools (36.4% compared to 12.8% in the Bronx and 14.5 in Manhattan, boroughs where key leaders of the current leadership in MORE are based.)

Queens high school voter turnout was clearly the crucial difference in winning the high school seats but admitting that would be counter to the narrative being pushed.

This turnout was mainly due to the organizing efforts of two key MORE members. (Ed Note: Details and analysis of 2016 high school elections at http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/2016/07/district-by-district-breakdown-shows_3.html?m=1).

This should have been an important lesson for MORE about the kind of activism by some more members that reaches out and resonates with rank and file teachers. Yet, these people are the very people who are being pushed out of MORE. One of these people is the chapter leader of the largest high school in Queens with 300 UFT members and an elected UFT Executive Board member.

The other was a former chapter leader of a closed school who led a valiant battle to keep his school open but who was forced to become an ATR. One of the most respected voices in the UFT for almost 30 years who developed hundreds of contacts in schools all around the city, and served for a decade on the UFT Executive Board. He too is being forced out of MORE.

Along with one of us, two of the four MORE Executive Board elected high school representatives are being pushed out of MORE. What does this mean for MORE as an organization when it feels activists with this history and stature and the overwhelming support of their colleagues don’t belong?

Instead of revisiting different petitions we advocated for or addressing the way we have utilized our positions on the UFT Executive Board to create voice for colleagues, the small group taking control of MORE chose to purposely ignore these results, criticized us, and attempted to micro-manage us over issues like class size and the defense of ATRS and rank and file UFT members over abusive principals because this work did not fit their preordained agendas.

Attempts to build a large, robust organization, including the creation of newsletters produced for wide distribution, planning meetings with topics related to school-based issues, like the nuts and bolts of enforcing the contract or running for chapter leader, and attempts to compete in union elections (both at the chapter level and for citywide officers), have been met with obstruction, in-fighting, frustrating layers of bureaucracy and the gradual disappearance of democratic decision making.

All this is a direct result of the group’s lack of democracy and failure to connect with members in our schools.

Predictably, instead of growing into a member driven movement, MORE has seen its numbers dwindle to levels rivaling our earliest beginnings in 2012. Instead of examining and discussing the reasons for the shrinking of MORE, such as the inability to develop a newsletter and distribution network or even a regular handout at the UFT Delegate Assembly, the constant excuse has been that all the problems in MORE have been due to some rude emails by a few people.

In fact, dozens of people have abandoned MORE over the years due to the rigid ideological framework imposed in MORE. Their “solution” to the crisis in MORE has been to actively move to push out even more members who do not go along with their line, many of them older and experienced in union politics, obviously a threat to their ability to win over new and inexperienced teachers who enter MORE to their ideological line. Rather than engage in discussion, including historical reference and analysis, they want to promote their own political positions, positions that are rarely open to debate.

It is especially difficult for us to remain with a group that no longer honors the principles of democracy. There was a glaring lack of due process involved in our recent suspension from the MORE listserves and the caucus’ steering committee, which just happened to remove our ability to vote on crucial decisions concerning the direction they wanted to steer MORE in. There is no provision in the by-laws from suspension from steering.

This decision began as a disagreement over political process and the tone of some emails. The suspensions were decided without either of us being present. Just four people out of nine on the committee created, ex-post facto, new rules. Since MORE is on record as opposing suspensions and calling for restorative justice for students, calls for the use of restorative justice practices in lieu of suspension in our case were voted down.

As union members, social justice activists, and New York City public school teachers, we cannot compromise the principle of due process. We must expect from ourselves the rights we demand for our co-workers and our students.

The loss of trust in the people who made these decisions will be difficult to repair. The realization that a caucus dedicated to the principles of social and restorative justice but can no longer muster enough respect for basic due process portends a future for the group that is far too troubling for us to be part of.

It is simply not acceptable to be involved with an organization that does not hold itself to the very values of democracy upon which it is premised and for which we have both worked.

There are many good people in and around MORE and we are proud of our past work with them. But too many priorities have changed over time, both for the group and for ourselves. We seek out the serious work of helping to build a more robust union, one that can affect policy as it improves the conditions under which we teach and our students learn. We have concluded MORE as a caucus is not capable or willing to build this movement. In order to work with rank and file UFT members and other stakeholders, we feel it’s better we separate ourselves now. We are leaving the organization and disassociate our names from it.

We still intend to spend time learning from our from past successes and failures in future endeavors we pursue.

There is a Janus decision on the horizon, a well financed effort by corporations and interest groups to undermine unions, and a relentless effort to privatize our schools by forcing out veteran UFT members and closing schools in our poorest neighborhoods, which harms our children of color and immigrant children. It is imperative that our union fights harder than ever against these forces.

We are dedicated to defending members unfairly under attack, ensuring our children are provided a great public education in well resourced schools, fighting for racial integration of schools, defending immigrant, African-American, Latino, Muslim, and LGBTQ union members and students. We will continue our work in our chapters, Delegate Assemblies and Executive Board meetings to educate and activate union members, defend public education, demand due process for our students and colleagues, and advance the cause of labor unions for all workers.

In Solidarity,

Mike Schirtzer: UFT Executive Board, UFT Delegate, Social Studies Teacher

John Giambalvo: Social Studies teacher, Coordinator of Student Activities

=======
John Giambalvo will is completing 18 years of service teaching social studies. He teaches in a Queens high school.

Mike Schirtzer, is a member of the UFT  Executive Board and a delegate from his school. He has been teaching social studies at Leon Goldstein HS in Brooklyn for 11 years

*=========
District 71 Manhattan High Schools: 683 votes= 14.5% of total HS turnout

District 72 Bronx High Schools: 594 votes=12.6%

District 73 Brooklyn High Schools: 729 votes=15.5%

District 76 Brooklyn-Staten Island High Schools: 984 votes=20.9%

District 77 Queens High Schools: 1712 votes=36.4%

Can Weak Unions Get Teachers More Money? - NY Times

In West Virginia, by contrast, the weakness of the unions left workers no choice but to take the lead. And the unions were in no position to resist. “I said the unions won’t start the movement, but if it hits critical mass, they’ll have to join in,” said Ryan Frankenberry, West Virginia director of the Working Families Party... NY Times

This is a very interesting piece sent to me by Abigail. I've been putting forth the theme for a long time that the stronger the union leadership -- ie. - Unity - the weaker the militancy from the rank and file because the union structure keeps a lid on and has the infrastructure to deflect or kill insurgencies.

An anti-Janus argument has been that unions control the workers and prevent wild-cat actions. I predicted that in NY State the politicians would set up post-Janus protections for the UFT since it is a partner and that process has begun with the Cuomo push to give  unions the right not to represent non-members. I bet more protection is to come - especially in the area of sole bargaining rights, which are weakened in right to work states. In other words, say of 20% of the UFT left and began to organize a counter union. In some states that is easier than others depending on state laws.s

This has been one of my major push backs within MORE against the proposal passed at the April 28 meeting to try to connect the red state insurgencies to the UFT by creating pressure from below to force the Unity/UFT leaders to engage in strike preparation. See South Bronx for complete proposal (MORE Presents It's Contract Demands of the UFT (Seriously)), which I will dissect in future posts (and probably get attacked within MORE for doing so.)

I have made the point that beside so many differences between NYC and West V et al (how many people in MORE have to work 2nd jobs to make ends meet?) the major difference is the weakness of union hierarchy (and due to right to work state laws, competition between the NEA and AFT for members) and the absolute strength of the UFT/Unity machine.

That in the face of this the MORE proposal also calls for MORE to not run in the 2019 UFT elections and focus instead on its strike prep campaign, only makes Unity even stronger. So go figure the logic of the MOREs.

The NYT article makes the point that the red state movements coming out of the rank and file are not sustainable without a union infrastructure and non-teaching union leaders somehow often just don't feel the pain and are less militant than classroom teachers who are fed up.

It is a must read:

Can Weak Unions Get Teachers More Money?

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/05/05/sunday-review/unions-teachers-money-strike.html?rref=collection%2Fsectioncollection%2Fsunday

By Noam Scheiber

May 5, 2018

On Thursday, a weeklong walkout by teachers in Arizona resulted in a major victory, as the state’s governor approved a 10 to 20 percent wage increase and a significant investment in public schools.

That followed a roughly $6,000 salary increase that Oklahoma teachers won by threatening a walkout (and later following through). Which in turn came on the heels of a 5 percent raise for teachers in West Virginia, who had shut down schools for almost two weeks.

The teachers were intent on making a statement. “No funding, no future!” they chanted in Oklahoma. And their mantra seemed to carry the day.

That all this took place in so-called right-to-work states, where the power of unions is limited, raises some interesting questions: Do weak unions go hand-in-hand with more effective political activism? Would strong organized labor prevent teachers from getting their way? After all, in Wisconsin, a state where unions were famously powerful, public sector workers suffered a historic defeat at the hands of Gov. Scott Walker in 2011.

Yet the reality is closer to the opposite.

Strong unions tend to be effective at securing gains for workers. Weak unions often shortchange the rank and file. The data show that workers in heavily unionized areas earn a significant premium over workers in lightly unionized areas. And unless the teacher movements in West Virginia, Oklahoma and Arizona breathe new life into unions, or birth lasting institutions to replace them, they are likely to be short-lived.

Perhaps counterintuitively, one need look no further than Wisconsin to appreciate the benefits of strong unions. The measures enacted by Governor Walker — which ended teachers’ ability to bargain collectively over anything but base wages and required the unions to win annual “recertification” votes to officially stay intact — should by all rights have destroyed public employee unions across the state. By some measures they did. Membership collapsed after 2011, from half of public employees to just over one quarter within five years.

But in certain parts of the state, the unions have not only remained viable, they’ve become more aggressive.

Consider Racine, a city of about 75,000 in southeastern Wisconsin, whose teachers have voted overwhelmingly to retain their union.

Just before the Walker measures were enacted, the union secured a two-year extension of its favorable contract — with strict rules on class size, staffing and evaluation procedures. When that contract ended, the union saw to it that most of the key elements were inserted into a “handbook,” said Peter Knotek, a recent president. That included a requirement that the district consult with the union on policy changes.

In 2015, the president of the Racine school board tried to eliminate this provision. His effort narrowly failed, but the teachers were not so forgiving. The union recruited candidates for the nine school board seats and locked down eight of them in the next year’s election.

“We were pursuing an agenda of growing power independent of any other institution in the community,” Aaron Eick, one of Mr. Knotek’s successors as union president, said in an interview last week.

The teachers’ union in Racine is proof that strong unions provide more than just wage increases and protection from arbitrary bosses. They provide a kind of social glue — making members feel invested in a larger mission and promoting a sense of solidarity. Thanks to their involvement in the union, Racine teachers immediately understood the threat that Governor Walker’s plan posed. Hundreds trooped to the capital to resist it.

“Very scared and conservative people were like, ‘All right, fine,’” Mr. Eick said. “People who you never would have thought would participate” got involved.

In West Virginia, by contrast, it was years before teachers rose up to protest their eroding standard of living.

Beginning in 2014, after the Republican-controlled Legislature refused to increase funding for health insurance, foisting benefit cuts and cost increases onto public sector workers, the teachers’ unions pleaded their case to lawmakers. But the unions were ineffectual because they struggled to rile up their membership. Even in many counties where the unions were active, most members were disengaged.

Nicole McCormick, a music teacher who helps lead the Mercer County local, said, “It was like the same 15 faces at every meeting,” even though there were hundreds of members. For the rest, she added: “I was having to say the same thing 25 times and they still wouldn’t understand. ‘What do you mean? What legislation?’”

Worse, the lack of collective bargaining rights set teachers against one another, distracting them from external threats. Without collective bargaining, no one union can operate as the exclusive representative of teachers in a county. In that vacuum, at least two unions competed to scare up members.

“The unions spend a lot of time trying to out-recruit the other one,” said Jay O’Neal, a seventh-grade English teacher from Charleston who was a leader of the protest movement.

Mr. O’Neal and his colleagues were remarkably successful at building momentum for the walkout through a Facebook group. But they won only a down payment on what they’d hoped for. The health insurance issue was deferred to a task force that began public hearings last week — not coincidentally, long after the fervor had subsided.

Mr. O’Neal observed that “we’ve seen people fall off, not be as involved” since the strike was resolved in March, pointing to another problem with weak unions: It is much easier to rouse people for a single, high-profile fight than for sustained advocacy. For that you need institutions that carry on the struggle while workers get on with their daily lives.

“I think sometimes it’s a little glib for people on the political left to say we should just have a more fired-up base,” said Joseph Slater, an expert on public employee unions at the University of Toledo College of Law. “Workers have full-time jobs.”

Of course, strong unions can bring their own baggage. Leaders can grow remote from their membership. A union’s strength may give it irrational confidence that it can defeat threats through conventional politics — like elections and lobbying — rather than more radical measures, like work stoppages.

In West Virginia, by contrast, the weakness of the unions left workers no choice but to take the lead. And the unions were in no position to resist. “I said the unions won’t start the movement, but if it hits critical mass, they’ll have to join in,” said Ryan Frankenberry, West Virginia director of the Working Families Party, who advised Mr. O’Neal and his colleagues.

But, in the end, there is no substitute for a strong union in a long-term struggle against powerful antagonists. And even the West Virginia walkout would have been impossible without the unions, which presided over an authorization vote in every county. “You can’t organize a strike on Facebook, even if everyone sounds really excited,” said Cathy Kunkel, an organizer with the progressive group Rise Up West Virginia who helped teachers strategize.

To really get teachers marching in lock step, Ms. Kunkel said, they needed the heft of a union.

Exploring Caucus Fault Lines: ICEUFT Meets Friday, MORE Meets Saturday

Friday, April 27, 8 AM

I came back from a 4 hour MORE contract committee meeting last night where a few of us (a very few of us) have been going over potential contract demands we are putting in a survey.

Jeez, 4 days of meetings in a row -- PEP on Wed (after the funeral of a neighbor's 40 year old daughter), contract committee Thurs, ICE today, MORE tomorrow. And a shiver call on Sunday. And I'm leaving soon to go out to Long Island to help the Botanic Garden plant sale people pick out plants. And I transplanted two trees over the past few days. And I still  need to process the video from the PEP. Oy -- is this retirement?

There are a whole bunch of people in MORE who are very excited about engaging in a militant fight for a "good" contract but when it comes to actually figuring out what a "good" contract might look like, the ICE people in MORE show up to do the work. MORE will probably vote to be militant for a good contract on Saturday - it doesn't really matter what constitutes a good contract, as long as they are militant and mention strike every 10 words. (For the old-timers out there who remember our old sister caucus, Teachers for a Just Contract -- or as we called them Teachers for Just a Contract, some ICE people have labeled this TJC 2.0.)

There's a lot going on in MORE on a lot of fronts. I intend to cover it all but can't keep up at times. James posted a proposal for ICE to permanently or temporarily withdraw support for MORE after the unfair suspensions of two ICE people from steering when they weren't present.

ICE doesn't bind people so no matter what the outcome of today's resolution, some will stay in MORE unless things get even more weird. Some are considering self-suspension in sympathy. You can read the comment of one of the suspendees here. Over time details will emerge.

I want to hear all the arguments from James and others but I am not planning to leave MORE but to stay there and do the work I feel is worthwhile like fighting closing schools and lower class size and abusive principals -- I mean if some of us don't raise these issues many of the MORE ideologues will just ignore them, as they have ignored the PEP where Black Lives Really Matter.

One of the very frustrating things about MORE is the seeming inability to engage in deep dives into issues, something ICEUFT has always done very well - to the exclusion of doing some other things. But MORE has young people who have a life and don't like to meet for too long a time. ICE people will meet and talk forever because they have a lot of things to talk about. And are mostly retired.

MORE has a lot of very political and sensitive people with limited powers of analysis, or willingness to see below the surface of things -- much younger than ICE people - and it shows at times. One of the heavy issues in MORE is people being rude on the listserve. That seems to tie people into knots with lots of angst and gnashing of teeth. Even I, a known caveman, have to tone it down.

But I try to imagine a group of people claiming to want to challenge the Unity machine, ed deformers, abusive principals, etc. but can't deal with a few (and it is very few) people supposedly making some crude comments - and I have at times have made some comments in the heat of the moment but have learned that listserves are not the best place to shoot off an angry email. So now I let things vegetate a bit and it works better.

The next two days should be fun. MORE on Saturday and ICEUFT Friday afternoon, starting at 4PM and ending till they toss us out of the diner. And all day Friday I'm driving out to Huntington with the crew from Brooklyn Botanic Gardens to pick out plants for the May 10 plant sale, for which I've been volunteering at for the past 35 years.

MORE will meet Saturday from 11-2:30, actually a longer meeting than usual. After that we will race over to the MORE family leave event which goes from 3-5. I would have gone home but my wife is coming into the city for world tai-chi day and trying to get half price tickets to a show. One of the great things about tai-chi, which I have never done, is that you can't tell if it's real people or statues.

Hey, if you are a regular reader of the blogs stop by for a while and have a dose of rice pudding. And hang with the Eternos, Gloria, Schirtzer, Lisa, Vera, Ellen, South Bronx, Giambalvo, maybe Arthur, and who knows who else might drop in? Email me offlist for details. normsco@gmail.com

You can also stop by the MORE meeting - if you haven't been flagellated recently.

My announcement of the ICEUFT  Meeting:

Meeting Friday: Independent Community of Educators

The Independent Community of Educators (ICE), one of the two founding caucuses in MORE, will be meeting Friday at 4PM to discuss a range of issues related to red state teacher revolts and recent actions in MORE. The meeting is expected to last three of four hours - or until everyone has had time to express their thoughts. Maybe midnight.

As usual ICE meetings are openly announced. As a consensus group with a wide range of opinions, all actions suggested are not binding on individuals.

Contact me offlist if interested in attending as there is limited space and meeting location might have to be changed.

Tentative agenda:

Undemocratic actions by MORE steering to suspend 2 members of steering, both associated with ICE, without due process and with ex post facto rules. The background behind a prominent member of MORE threatening to leave MORE unless one of them was purged from MORE and the so-called compromise reached to suspend them for a month, thus removing two potential votes on steering that might be in opposition to the initiatives being pushed.

Other undemocratic acts within MORE, including the moderator of the debate, unilaterally called for the MORE meeting to be closed to members only, the first time this has been done in the history of MORE. Plus the extremely constrictive rules promulgated by the moderator, one of the 30 people who signed the proposal.

An official response from ICE, including calls for ICE to formally suspend or withdraw its support of MORE? Discussion on options, including total withdrawal.

Objectively analyze red state teacher revolts vis a vis current and future conditions in the UFT.
The viability of the current proposal being floated in MORE, which is a reminder of the program put forth by the other caucus that formed MORE, TJC (See Ed Notes on the relationship between ICE and TJC over the years.)

James posted this on the ICE blog:

ICEUFT MEETING FRIDAY AFTERNOON IN MANHATTAN WILL DISCUSS PROPOSAL TO SUSPEND ICE SUPPORT FOR MORE

The Independent Community of Educators (ICEUFT) will be holding a meeting tomorrow (Friday) in Manhattan at 4:00 P.M.

It is no big secret that the relationship between ICEUFT and the Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE) has been frayed at times and lately it has kind of exploded. I have written the following resolution that I will bring up tomorrow. It kind of speaks for itself.

Whereas, a group within the Steering Committee in the Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE) has suspended two Steering Committee members who are associated with the Independent Community of Educators (ICEUFT) without any due process or authority to suspend people;

Whereas, due process is a fundamental human right and a basic principle of democracy that cannot be compromised; and

Whereas, the Independent Community of Educators (ICEUFT) on principle will not have anything to do with an organization that denies its members basic democratic rights; be it therefore

Resolved, that the Independent Community of Educators (ICEUFT) suspends all support for the Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE) until further notice; and be it further

Resolved, that the Independent Community of Educators (ICEUFT) will continue its work to advocate for the members of the United Federation of Teachers and for public education.

This is Norm Scott's agenda for the ICEUFT meeting:
Members of the Independent Community of Educators (ICE), founded in 2003, original organizers of the Grassroots Education Movement (GEM) and one of the founding caucuses of MORE, will be meeting to discuss a range of issues, including a discussion of the red state teacher revolts and the status of its ongoing relationship with MORE, on Friday, April 27 at 4PM

The MORE Meeting announcement - note how little information is given about what has been going on to the MORE membership.

REMINDER: Please try to attend this important meeting that will discuss the future direction of the caucus.

MORE General Meeting 

Sat. April 28

11am-2:30pm

CUNY Graduate Center

Room 5414

365 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 365 5th Ave, New York, NY 10016

Proposed Agenda:

• Contract Strategy Proposal
  
• Committee Reports
  
• New Items/ Sharing of concerns

Join us afterwards at the Parental Leave Forum - From 3-5 PM at the Ya Ya Center  - RSVP Here on FB - 224 West 29 Street, 14th floor, New York, NY 10001

You may RSVP on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/2036581303221106/

If you'd like to help out in some way contact john.antush@gmail.com or peter.lamphere@gmail.com 

Are NYC UFT Members Ready to Pull a Red State Teacher Rebellion? What Would it Take?

There are a group of people in MORE who think the militancy of

UFT negotiating strategy

teachers in the red states can be translated to NYC. Others, knowing the mentality of the people they work with, have their doubts. That doesn't mean MORE should sit on its hands. Not to accept the Unity argument we can't win anything back we lost. Put forth a package of demands that include working conditions for a school system we would be happy to work in instead of the Unity acceptance of the pattern and no more. MORE is in the process of doing that.

A story on Tuesday's Brian Lehrer show included an interview with an Oklahoma 38-year teacher who makes around $44k a year and has about 4 jobs. A teacher from New Jersey called in who makes 90K a year. The OK guy practically swallowed his phone.

Then Brian looked up NYC salaries and said starting salary next year will be over 60k. And top of course is going to be 118K. Taking cost of living into account NYS is 17th in real salary. The red states are near the bottom. Here is the promo:

On Monday, teachers in Kentucky and Oklahoma walked out of school to protest cuts in pay, benefits and school funding. Josh Eidelson, labor reporter at Bloomberg News, and Lawrence Lane, a history teacher from Checotah, Oklahoma, and an OEA member, talk about the strikes, which have grown in force since starting in West Virginia earlier this year.

Have a listen to the 19 minute segment:

The salary issue in the red states is crucial -- they haven't had a raise in a decade since the recession cuts. Here in NYC people may bitch about the retro - but do you think retro pay is even on the table? WV people got a 5% raise. Imagine if they said they wouldn't go back without retro pay.

Now the smart thing coming from the instincts of people in the trenches has been building coalitions outside the teacher circle - gettting parents on their side, but also non-teaching union members who are part of the education landscape -- ie, school bus drivers.

There are other issues in the red states where education has been cut to the bone and teachers are working under horrendous conditions. Their fire is aimed at the governors and state legislatures. While we saw the teachers in Wisconsin slaughtered, this is a new ballgame.

Are teachers here in NYC working under similar horrendous conditions? Reading the blogs you'd think they are. Not being in the schools all I can tell is that Danielson, discipline, large classes, abusive supervisors are some key issues. When I go to MORE meetings or to Delegate Assemblies and Ex Bd meetings people complain but I don't get that there is some flash point that would actually make teachers go out on strike. In fact I don't hear as many complaints from the MORE people about their working conditions as I do on the blogs. Could it be that the MOREs have managed to find reasonably safe schools for themselves and thus don't feel the same pressure teachers working under ogres feel. (See the post from Art and Design HS teachers which is getting a lot of hits - Dear Mr. Mulgrew: The UFT chapter at the High School of Art and Design has been living under distress and oppression for the past two years.

Another factor is that these are wildcat actions - out of the classrooms, not the union leaderships, which are jumping on board. I've been reporting that these relatively weak union leaderships have opened up space for people in the schools to organize. Facebook has been a key organizing tool, thus allowing them to communicate with each other without the filter of the union mechanisms. Some pages grew to 20,000 people in no time. You've got to reach a point of desperation to be willing to lose your job -

There is no sense of desperation here in NYC by massive numbers of teachers. Or of there is they just leave the system.

We have Unity Caucus running the union and their machine with the district reps as middle managers have access to every school and every UFT members and the ability to dampen enthusiasm for job actions while also threatening people with the consequences of an illegal strike - 2 for 1 penalties for every day on strike for the teachers and for the union itself, massive fines.

Can there be wildcat actions here in NYC? Hard to imagine that happening. Imagine if even 10 schools went out en masse, especially since the UFT would tell them "I told you so" and abandon them.

We might see pockets of blue flu stuff where large numbers of people call in sick --  In essence that may be happening without our knowing in schools with horrendous supervisors. I imagine the absentee rate in these schools is higher.

A massive blue flu might keep DOE legal happy. I can see possibly some people starting a facebook page and getting a response but Unity trolls would jump on to disparage it.

So what issues might spur people to greater militancy?

If they try to take shit away.

That was an issue in Kentucky where they are trying to cut pensions. What impressed me about the KY teachers was that they are protesting the attempt to fundamentally eliminate guaranteed pensions for newbies -- the unborn as we used to call it.*

Here in NYC I can see the masses stirring (a bit) if there is an attempt to take away what people have. The major threat seems to be healthcare reductions. Read James Eterno at the ICE Caucus blog: http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/2018/04/pba-files-for-binding-aritration-will.html.
Make sure to read the comments -- and comment yourself.

James reports on the offer to the police - PBA.

The City’s latest purported offer to NYC PBA members is the worst they have seen so far, featuring dramatic increases in out-of-pocket health benefit costs and other givebacks that would effectively wipe out the paltry wage increases they would receive. Among the City’s startling demands:

The health benefits reductions similar to those the de Blasio administration is seeking to obtain from the entire city workforce through the Municipal Labor Committee (MLC), including the imposition of new medical deductibles, as well as a tiered copayment structures intended to drive members to utilize City-run Health + Hospitals Corporation hospitals and their affiliated doctors. For example, members who utilize top-tier hospitals and their affiliated doctors instead of HHC facilities would see their hospital in-patient copayments increase from the current $300 to $3,000 and their primary care doctor and specialist co-payments increase from the current $15 to $40.

A 57% reduction in the City’s contributions to the PBA Health & Welfare Funds, which provide NYC PBA members with prescription drug coverage and other benefits. This move would result in dramatic reductions in or the complete elimination of benefits provided to PBA members.

The elimination of the PBA Annuity Fund for both current members and future hires.

Along with thes draconian givebacks, the de Blasio administration is demanding that NYC PBA members accept below-inflation raises totaling 3.25% over two years, including months of zero raises.

Is this enough to stir the pot in the UFT?

Some of my pals in MORE seem to think they can be the straw that stirs the drink by agitating around the new contract. I'm betting on the Unity machine being able to counter whatever MORE throws up against the wall, hoping it will stick.

Let me repeat. That doesn't mean MORE should sit on its hands. Not to accept the Unity argument we can't win anything back we lost. Put forth a package of demands that include working conditions for a school system we would be happy to work in instead of the Unity acceptance of the pattern and no more. MORE is in the process of doing that.

But look down the road a few years to post-Janus and we may see a different landscape if the Unity patronage machine is weakened and they no longer have the personnel to blanket the schools with their message of caution. If MORE is still around then, who knows?

*Mayor Giulianni tried to do something along those lines against newbies in the 1995 contract -- I remember some kind of fee newbies would have to pay and would get back only if they stayed in the system for a certain amount of years. Believe it or not, that was a key issue in the rejection of  the contract by UFT members for the only time in history. The bigger issue was raising the number of years to reach top salary from 20 to 25 years. Female teachers went nuts, feeling they were hit harder because of the years they took for child care. The reworked contract cut it to 23 years.