Lois Weiner and Bruce Markens were 2 of the most respected independent voices in the UFT. Bruce is truly the only independently elected district rep in history - he served for a decade as Manhattan HS DR despite repeated attempts by Unity to defeat him. He was so despised by Unity that when he retired I asked Randi to say something at the DA about his years of service and she refused. He was the reason she ended Dist Rep elections 2 years after he retired. Bruce and I are getting together with Mike Schirtzer and some others after the New Year to pass the historical torch so Mike can tell the story in 25 years -
and Mike met with Lois, Julie and some other MOREistas last week to get her current point of view.
I only met Lois after she had left the system and went into academia. She was the one who recruited Vera Pavone and I to write the review of the Kahlenberg Shanker bio which was published in New Politics. http://newpol.org/content/albert-shanker-ruthless-neo-con
Lois and Bruce have written an important historical document about Unity Caucus and the opposition from the point of view of a generation ago.
One of the things we see being sold by some today is the umbrella group idea where each caucus operates on its own and then comes together for elections or certain issues. Coalition caucus politics has been a failure throughout the history of the UFT opposition. ICE and TJC learned that lesson after a years of wrestling with each other and finally came together in MORE. Though there is still some internal wrestling, there is the sense that even a shotgun marriage is better than what was there before.
Here Bruce talks about how that worked out between 1981 (really since my group the CSW worked with TAC in the 1977 elections) through the writing of this article in 1990. NAC was the coalition of 3 caucuses initially and then 2. New Action was the result of the merger in 1996.
Imagine - in those years the opposition could pull high vote totals in middle and high schools but could never make a dent in the elementary and functional and of course the retiree divisions. In fact, in the elections following this 1990 article, the opposition won 13 Ex Bd seats - its highest totals ever.
After New Action formed from the merger of TAC and New Directions in 1996 it had some success in the high schools by winning those seats through the 2001 elections. But seeing their advantage slipping away they jumped at the deal offered by Randi - don't run against her in exchange for Unity not running against NA for the HS seats. In 2003 I and others, unhappy with the state of the opposition - New Action, a fairly nascent TJC at that point and a 3rd caucus - Progressive Action - focused on one major item - teacher licensing - formed ICE as yet another alternative. (Hey - do you believe in choice?) While there was initial excitement that faded by the 2007 elections and ICE drifited into inactivity and into GEM and MORE. A real lesson for me - and others - which ultimately has led back to an attempt to create one unified opposition voice in MORE.
Attempts to brand Solidarity as a bridge group between New Action and MORE and a mostly dormant ICE will come to naught and maybe in 25 years someone will write this version of history.
If you have trouble reading the document below, go to this link where it will be larger.
https://www.scribd.com/doc/247106770/The-UFT-After-Shanker-Lois-Weiner-and-Bruce-Markens
