Gotham Schools seems to think New Action is an internal opposition group

Have I got a bridge to sell them.

I left a comment at Gotham after they posted a link to the New Action positioning statement. Yes, NA is all about political positioning for the upcoming UFT elections so they can hold onto the 8 exec bd seats handed to them by Unity Caucus. The "house" opposition.

Calling New Action an internal opposition group is like saying Christine Quinn stood up to Bloomberg. New Action has been the UFT's house opposition for over 5 years. Weingarten ran at the top of their ticket in the 2007 election and all 8 of their exec board members were endorsed by the UFT leadership Unity Caucus. In the 2007 election they got the lowest vote total of all groups running but only won their seats due to Unity Caucus votes.

So how are they an internal opposition when the party in power controls their fate?

Their original sellout in 2003 was based on the same premise they are advocating in this post: it is time to fight Bloomberg. That was their excuse for not running a candidate against Weingarten in the last 2 UFT elections and they will not run a candidate against Mulgrew in the upcoming elections. Since they owe their continued existence to the beneficence of the UFT leadership, they cannot be critical or they will lose their support. Thus they have to come up with the "mistakes were made by the leadership but let's not dwell on them" argument to justify their sellout.

New Action mentions charters but in fact backed the UFT all the way when it set up its own charter schools in public school buildings while ICE and TJC took positions opposed, knowing full well the charter dagger was squarely aimed at the heart of the union.

The New Action statement says:

Today we need a united stand. We will need to talk about the mistakes that we as a union have made: Mayoral endorsement, governance, term limits, but another day. This is not the time for recriminations. This is the time for a united fight against this corporate mayor.

When is the time to talk about the mistakes of a misguided UFT leadership that New Action has been uncritical of since the sellout? Note there is no mention of the other mistakes: the 2005 contract – which both members of New Action who served on the negotiating committee at the time voted for despite their attempts to rewrite history. Or the mistake of the end of seniority. Or the ATR problem that was created by the UFT and BloomKlein. New Action supported the leadership throughout these "mistakes."

New Action has supported the UFT leadership without dwelling on the mistakes for all these years. They act like there will be a change despite the fact that New Action has been around for decades and seen little change in the way Unity Caucus operates.

There was a time when New Action put up a fight to create a more democratic union. Now they are part of the problem. Progressive teachers looking to reform the UFT in no way consider them an internal opposition, but a former opposition that has sold out to the leadership for a few Executive Board seats and some minor positions on the payroll of the UFT.

UFT Election Musings: What Can Be Won and Is it Worth it to Try?

The Eternos and I at Tues Nite Yankee game

The other day I posted some thoughts based on the recent MORE retreat:
MORE Doesn't Retreat at Retreat Plus Some of My UFT Elections Thoughts - Don't Kvetch, Organize!

ICE, MORE, New Action get together at Yankee game: a precursor of things to come?

James and Camille, joined by Ellen Fox and Ed Beller talked about some of this election stuff at the Yankee victory-- NORM SCOTT, CAMILLE AND JAMES ETERNO PLOT ELECTION MOVES
- they were happy even though Camille, James and Ed are Mets fans because the Mets won too. Other than Ed, we are all UFT political junkies - we tried to talk between innings or during pitching changes.

All of them were in New Action until the 2003 sellout. Ellen and the Eternos left to help form ICE while Ed remained in New Action. Ed, James and Ellen were all elected and re-elected as high school executive board members repeatedly during the 90s through 2001, getting over 3000 votes each time.Ed is no longer active in union politics.

I pointed out in my blog piece that the 7 high school UFT exec bd seats were winnable by MORE in the upcoming election based on the 2013 numbers. They are winnable because retirees don't get to vote in that portion of the election. And neither do any of the high school non-teaching staff like secretaries, paras, guidance, social workers get to vote for these 7 positions. Classroom high school teachers only. This used to be the case for the HS VP position - until Unity lost in the mid-80s and changed the rules in 1994.

Unity is used to changing the rules when they lose. After New Action once again won the then 6 HS ex bd seats in 2001 - with over 3000 votes - Randi figured out a clever way to prevent this from happening by buying New Action and offering to hand them these seats by not running any Unity candidates against them. All they had to do was let Randi run unopposed. And so they did - except ICE and TJC threw a monkey wrench into the scheme by running and winning these 6 positions.

James and Jeff Kaufman for ICE did such a powerful job for 3 years, Unity - and New Action were mortified and thus made sure that no independent voice (non-Unity endorsed) representing classroom teachers without conditions would get on the Ex Bd. In 2007, for the first time, Unity put New Action people on the Unity slate so they could win -- and they split the HS Ex Bd seats between them. (When they raised it from 6 to 7, the split was 4-3, Unity.

New Action would ask some questions, maybe raise a reso or 2 and then make sure everyone got to go home on time. They are the loyal, well-behaved "opposition", so unlike the aggressive Jeff and James were. Everyone goes home happy - when James and Jeff were there, Unity did not go home happy.

New Action high school vote totals dropped from 3000 in 2001 to around 700 in 2004 - and 450 by 2014 - so how did that work out? Pretty good for them I guess since they are handed 10 ex bd seats and some jobs. Not so good for rank and file teachers.

So, let's get back to the 2016 elections.
To beat Unity + New Action + any other vagrant caucus running would take an extraordinary effort and require MORE to focus most of its resources on the high school election, probably ignoring other areas like elementary and middle schools and functionals - all areas where retirees don't vote.

To win 7 out of 100 Ex Bd seats - for what purpose? To make some noise? To take us to where New Action was 15 years ago? Their focus on these seats never led them to build much more of a base outside the high schools. And what do you do if you win? Go to meetings like ICE did every 2 weeks to support your people in a total Unity environment?

On the other hand, a win would show that Unity can still be beaten and it would restore an independent voice.

On the other hand, if MORE intends to go much beyond where New Action was before the dirty deal with Unity, it needs to reach deep into the schools. A focus on winning the high schools could distract MORE from that goal.

On the other hand, MORE could use the actions at the Ex Bd to raise issues of concern - it is easier to do there than at the DA since once you get 5 Ex bd people to sign on a reso must be dealt with.
And given that nothing else can really be won, why not go for this?

On the other hand, how exactly do you sell people on getting involved in an election that can win only such a small sliver of 7% of Ex bd and no officer or AFT/NYSUT delegate positions?

OY VEY!

While touching on some of these issues at the retreat, MORE did not get into the discussion in depth and is still far from getting deep into election stuff, focused more on supporting people in the schools.

Should MORE go for these seats even if the other parts of the campaign suffer? Given that MORE got almost 5000 votes in the 2013 election, can even 5-10% of these people be activated in a way to take part in the campaign beyond just voting - like becoming a spokesperson for MORE In their school and making sure people vote?

As for me, I am still not committed to getting deeply involved in yet another election but would appreciate any of your thoughts either in the comments section or by email.

UFT Elections, 4:30PM: Elementary Schools and Functionals

Only division left is Retirees in about half an hour but I'm leaving for the victory party while Ellen, Joan and James hold the fort.

This may be the only division we lose to New Action. We were running last on some quick looks in this category -- we estimate New Action with about 10+% of the retiree vote and MORE with about 6-7%. Actually, this may be the beginning of some minor erosion of Unity but we have to check the finals vs past elections.

Elem total slate 6870  Non slate 297 to be counted.

MORE - 1140
NA 534
Unity 5111

In 2010:
Total: 7761
ICE/TJC - 703
NA - 978

2013 Functionals (non teachers)   Ballots Returned: 7704   Ballots Counted: 7113
MORE: 951                   NEW ACTION: 754                UNITY: 5167



Keys are in comparing results for ICE/TJC and MORE over past few elections.
Unity dropped in functionals by over 2000 votes while MORE gained 200 but still did not top ICE/TJC 2004/07 totals. NA dropped by over 300.
This is slate votes only with 500 split ballots.

Only elem and retirees to go.
We're aiming to come in with more total votes than New Action and then use their 10 seats on the bd while we have none as a democratic battering ram.

Here is James' report on the ICE blog before we had the elem results.

Thursday, April 25, 2013

FIRST ELECTION RESULTS SHOW MORE MAKES SUBSTANTIAL GAINS OVER ICE-TJC NUMBERS FROM 2010

We have initial slate only numbers for the high schools and the middle schools in the UFT election and although Unity and New Action will hold onto their monopoly on power, the new Movement of Rank and File Educators (MORE) established itself as the main opposition group in the secondary schools by a wide margin.

Here are the slate numbers for the 2013 and 2010 elections in the secondary schools.

2013  Hi;gh Schools   Ballots Returned: 3808   Votes Counted: 3595    
MORE: 1430 (40%)   NEW ACTION: 452 (13%)       UNITY: 1592 (45%)

The remainder are people who split their ballot. 

2010 High Schools    Votes Counted: 5203
MORE: 1369                 NEW ACTION: 774               UNITY: 2595

2013 Middle Schools   Ballots Returned: 1879      Votes Counted: 17886
ICE-TJC: 398                NEW ACTION: 161                   UNITY:1185

The remainder are people who split their ballot.

2010 Middle Schools: Slate Votes Counted: 2881
ICE-TJC: 248                NEW ACTION: 421                UNITY: 1981   

2013 Functionals (non teachers)   Ballots Returned: 7704   Ballots Counted: 7113
MORE: 951                   NEW ACTION: 754                UNITY: 5167

The remainder are people who split their ballot.    


We still have not heard from the traditional Unity strongholds of the Elementary Schools and the retirees so Unity will easily win but with much lower totals than in 2010.

Something is wrong with the UFT electoral system when New Action gets only 13% of the high school votes but wins half of the UFT Executive Board seats for the high schools while MORE's 40% will get MORE no representation on the Executive Board.

It is obvious that a clear majority of the high school teachers who vote do not want a Unity monopoly on power.  Had this been a traditional two party UFT election, there would be truly independent opposition representation (no Unity cross endorsement needed).

Two other stories emerge at first glance.  First, the turnout was pitiful as only 43,138 ballots are being counted.  More significantly, 22,462 of those votes are from retirees.  That constitutes 52% of the voters. I would question if having retirees as the majority of the electorate is healthy for the union.

In addition, Mulgrew's vote will more than likely drop in a major way compared to 2010 among active UFT members.  It appears many members did not vote for the opposition but they certainly didn't vote for the incumbent.  For the next election, those members need to be persuaded to vote.

Revised - The Unity 300 - UFT Retiree Chapter Sends 300 to Delegate Assembly - Why I Am Boycotting the Election

Note the weakness of this argument as a reason to vote for RA against Unity:

Voting and participating in our nation’s elections and our union’s elections are the only way we can have a voice in issues that determine the way we live. By actively participating in the process we become a vibrant force in retirement.

The only way to have a voice? Where is the call for a democratic process in the UFT that would make elections mean something?

Why don't people vote? Because Unity has so locked up the process as to make it impossible to win anything.

Here was the one opportunity every 3 years to reach every retiree in the union and expose the sham of Unity caucus.

The worst thing about this is that it doesn't even talk about what this election is really about for Unity -- packing 300 more Unity delegates into the DA. It is not enough for the general UFT election process to be rigged -- but they make sure to fill the seats at the DA with loyalists who no longer have anything to lose in the assault on teachers.

This is pablum and what we would expect from the loyal opposition - if you can call it even that. Participating in this process without attacking it is endorsing some of the most fundamental undemocratic processes in the union. I'll pass on voting until RA or any other group of retirees really takes on Unity..... Norm to ICE mail

It may seem counter-intuitive for me to sit out the current retiree election and not vote for the Retiree Advocate, which is running against Unity in the retiree chapter election. I will vote for independent Roberta Reid - I give Roberta credit for putting in the effort - and a very few candidates I know). I consider RA to be New Action light.

Catering at Unity Caucus meetings

[See NYC Educator: New Action Takes a Position on Semi-Democracy]


Think of it -- every 3 years RA can send out something to 60,000 retirees and not a word of real criticism or exposure of Unity Caucus.

What does it mean to a union when retirees no longer facing the travails of daily teaching have a major say in UFT policy bodies? A lot of people complain about retirees voting in general UFT elections, especially when 52% of the votes cast in the 2013 election came from retirees. But that doesn't bother me that much and won't until an opposition can capture the majority of votes of the working teachers. Then I would go to court. So far that is not happening.

To me the more insidious undemocratic actions are the current chapter elections going on in the functional retiree chapter for chapter leader, an exec board and for 300 delegates to the UFT DA. The UFT constitution calls for one delegate for every 60 members in a chapter. That the retiree chapter, with probably close to 60,000 members, is treated the same as a school is beyond outrage -- (I believe the max number of delegates is capped at 300.)

When I retired I attended a few retiree meetings and found them worse than the DA -- the Unity leadership is only interested in using retirees for its political campaigns - but also the Unity 300 as a force to make sure they don't lose control of the DA.

This allows old Unity loyalists to participate in the DA - and in fact pack it when needed. Let me explain. The 300 don't show up at every meeting. When there is challenge from the opposition for an upcoming DA, Unity Caucus calls a post-DA meeting - with catering - to get those retirees out to the DA -- and I believe attendance is taken too.

The DA is packed with Unity loyalists - as Arthur points out today at NYC Educator - Why Aren't People Standing for UFT Delegate?

I represent the largest high school in Queens, we have multiple delegates, but making them come would not make a dent in the pre-determined results. When Unity leadership sends the message, everyone knows and acts accordingly. It's infuriating to see the DA represented as a place where decisions are made, as opposed to a place where people are telegraphed how to vote, with virtually no subtlety whatsoever. 

I have tried to get  dissident voices heard by leadership, and the DA is just about the worst forum in which I could do it.

Arthur talks about how James Eterno was shut down at the May 2014 contract DA. Julie Cavanagh who ran against Mulgrew was next at the mic and Mulgrew shut down the debate because he was so afraid of Julie's getting a chance to speak -- even people in Unity raised their eyebrows at this -- big, bad Mulgrew - afraid of a girl.

There are over 3500 delegates and the 300 retirees are less than 10%. But rarely do more than about 800 - if even that - attend. As Arthur points out - what is the point? To his credit, he shleps in from eastern Queens every month and writes up the meetings -- and then we head to Chipotle for dinner. Next year Eterno will be back as the only ATR delegate elected from a school to add his wisdom.

Let's assume half of the Unity retirees - 150 - come to the DA - the number jumps to 15-20% of the delegates. No wonder they voted down the major MORE resolutions this year on protecting ATRs by giving them a chapter, a reso opposing high stakes testing and support for the opt-out movement.

Now back to the Retiree Advocate, which advertizes itself as an independent caucus in the UFT retiree chapter with members from various groups, including ICE and New Action. But it is overwhelmingly New Action and their literature reflects the New Action non-militancy. There is not one word of criticsm of Unity Caucus or its undemocratic process, especially in this election that puts 300 delegates in the DA. Even a minimal call for proportional representation would make sense. (Meaning if RA gets 30% of the vote they would get 90 of the 300 delegates). And there is no call for controlling the influence of retirees in the general UFT elections. They refuse to take on these issues because they are pandering for votes.

-- RA is New Action light.

New Action, which has ran Mulgrew as its presidential candidate in 2010 and 13 (and Randi in 2007) is a major force in RA with some of their key people running. Two years ago, the leaders of RA acted as a front group for New Action in pushing hard for a MORE/New Action alliance and set up a meeting - which was controversial in MORE because many did not want to meet with New Action until they renounced their deal with Unity. But in a close vote, the meeting was set up and Eterno, Julie and I were chosen to rep MORE. James had an emergency and couldn't make it. NA and RA people pushed for cooperation. Julie made eloquent statements about how we cannot work with people who support Mulgrew -- we told NA to call us when they were ready to talk about alliances when they decide to rejoin the opposition. (There is an audio tape of that Nov. 2013 meeting.)

New Action, many of whom are running on the RA slate have jobs with the UFT - and in fact they are running New Action leader Michael Shulman, who makes 15 grand a year working for the UFT, for Retiree Ex Bd.

On this issue RA is silent. Thus I can't vote for slate that echos New Action to such an extent.

By the way -- I am a forgiving soul - the second I hear New Action gets serious about abandoning the dirty deal with Unity, in the interests of uniting the opposition, I would urge MORE to open a dialogue. But my guess is that New Action has too much to gain - in terms of Ex Bd seats - to give up that deal.

New Action Supported UFT Charter Schools

This comment

Thank God for New Action. The UFT needs change. The UFT needs to start to fight for its members who are fighting with all their might, all on their own against charter schools. It is terrible the UFT, the teachers unions, is sitting back and doing NOTHING! That is what teachers pay for and the UFT does absolutely NOTHING!

at the Gotham Schools posting that made it seem New Action was an opposition caucus led to my response below:

New Action at one time used to be for change, but as partners with the UFT leadership for the past 7 years that is all over. They used to actually have a decent platform calling the UFT leadership undemocratic and calling for democratization of the union. Now that they got theirs, all that has disappeared.

How can the UFT fight charter schools when they have two of their own? And occupying space in public schools. And New Action supported them all the way, with some New Action members volunteering in the charters. ICE and TJC were opposed to the establishment of the charters because it was clear what was coming down the line and having their own charters would make a fight impossible. The UFT strategy was to "show them we can do it with a union contract," which New Action has supported. Then they sign a contract with Green Dot charter, also not opposed by New Action. Now their strategy is not to oppose charters but to try to organize them. Sort of like going back to the 1950's. The charters will remove public schools and the UFT will try to sell charter school teachers on the concept of "look how incompetent we have been in defending NYC teachers, now give us a chance to screw you too."

I know. Some say better any union contract than nothing. But the idea is so ass backwards as to make your hair hurt. The tidal wave is coming and the UFT is using a thimble to bail. And New Action will be there with them all the way.

ICE, TJC, Ed Notes and GEM have been working on positions that place the charter attack on public education in context. We have also been on the front lines supporting public school parents and teachers in their struggles over shared space. It was no accident that ICE's Lisa North's picture was on the front page of the NY Times yesterday in the story on charters. Angel Gonzalez, other GEMers and I also were there to support them. New Action has had zero presence at any of these charter school battles, even less than the bare presence the UFT leadership itself has had.

Related:
The New Action blog doesn't allow comments.

Ed Notes Redux: UFT Election Results, 1999 - New Action Vote Drops 75% Over Years But They Gain More Ex Bd Seats

New Action Off the cliff

New Action  received 31% in ‘91. New Action received 24% in ‘99. PAC received 2%.... Ed Notes, May, 1999 election analysis

New Action with this tremendous drop in vote totals between '99 (11,500) and '13 (3600 - half from retirees) goes from 'winning" 6  Ex Bd seats in '99 to ten EB seats in '13. Ahhhh, democracy at work! 

I've been going through the archives for a project geared to making print copies of ed notes available online. Until that is done I am publishing items of interest that might provide perspective.

Note the trend from '91, soon after NA was formed from a merger of Teachers Action Caucus and New Directions in 1990 when they got 31% of the vote. By '99 the opposition totals dropped to 26% -- call it the Randi effect -- she was initially selling reform of the union. That had disappeared by 2001 but NA was not capable of organizing and when totals dropped again in the 2001 election Randi jumped in to buy herself an opposition caucus.

For the record, as an independent Ed Notes, after the 2001 election I tried to broker a united front between all opposition forces but it fell apart, which led me to start thinking of the need for an alt caucus and the concept of a citywide edition of Ed Notes (beginning in Fall, 2002 after I retired) which became the basis of ICE. It took another 10 years to forge the highest degree of a united front with MORE (except for the now outlier, New Action). So much irony all over the place.

There were 2 opposition caucuses running in 1999: New Action and Progressive Action, a group focused on the licensing issue. Note return totals- so much higher than today. Did the NA sellout have an impact on lowering vote totals? NA in the high schools with Paul Milstein running for HS veep received 2880 to John Soldini's 2517 yet Soldini was elected because the entire union voted for that position. Union dues without representation. Throw that tea in the bay.

In the 2013 election New Action got 452 slate votes to MORE's 1430 and Unity's 1592. Even better. NA's total votes has dropped in 14 years from 11,500 to 1900 working people plus 1800 retirees, many of whom still think NA is a real opposition. In other words almost half the NA vote came from retirees in '13. So how is that collaboration deal with Unity working out?

Yet, even better, New Action with this tremendous drop in vote totals goes from 'winning" 6 (or 7) Ex Bd seats in '99 to ten EB seats in '13. Ahhhh, democracy at work!

Think of these numbers given that 30,000 more ballots were mailed out in 2013 and about 4000 more in HS. Also note that over 17,000 votes were returned by retirees in '99 and about 22,000 14 years later with a much larger membership pool. Even though 52% of the total vote in a weak turnout, even retirees (with 25,000 more ballots mailed) are losing interest.

Here is my commentary from the May 1999 edition of Ed Notes:

UFT Elections: Looking at the numbers (non-slate votes not included). PAC votes basically irrelevant,except in Academic HS, so not included. 

Interesting Points 

Retirees are the happiest people in our union. They returned the highest percentage (51%) of the ballots, because they clearly had the time to wade through all the names. (The other 49% were too busy getting ready for The Earlybird Special.) Retirees are happy with the way things are going and voted for Unity by 85%. The 33,000 retirees are the 3rd biggest block in the union. After the massive retirement expected in 2 years, they will clearly be the largest voting block. At some point we have to deal with the issue of the impact retirees have on the working conditions of active teachers. If retirees didn’t vote, Unity would have received 67% of the total vote in- stead of 74%, still a significant victory.

Election Facts
Ballots mailed: 136,565
Ballots returned: 49,108 (36%)
Ballots not returned: 103,023 (64%)
Ballots mailed to active members: 103, 023 Ballots returned by active members: 31,908 (31%) Ballots mailed to retirees: 33,542
Ballots returned by retirees: 17,200 

There has been little change in voting patterns for last 5 elections. Unity’s share of the vote has grown from 69% in 1991. NAC received 31% in ‘91. New Action received 24% in ‘99. PAC received 2%. Their impact was minimal, other than perhaps causing some people who would have voted with the opposition, to not vote at all and could explain, to some extent, the higher than usual (69%) of ballots not returned by active teachers. That’s over 70,000 ballots not returned
by ctive teachers. Is it apathy or a silent vote against all caucuses?

Academic High Schools
The only division where New Action had some success. They won half the Academic high school Executive Board seats (the rest were at large) and received about 52% of the vote. With PAC’s vote added in, the opposition polled 55% of the vote in this division. They did not win the Academic HS VP position because these positions are voted on at large, a change instituted by Unity Caucus after the last time an opposition candidate won this position.This is a bad policy for the union as it disenfranchises the divisional voters. 

Vote the ICE-TJC Slate in the Upcoming UFT Elections

This leaflet is available in pdf format for downloading and distribution to your school. Or if preferred, enough copies can be sent directly to you. Past rulings assure all UFT members access to mailboxes in their schools (at all times) and other schools during this election period as long as it is off working hours. Problems? Contact ICE.

Independent Community of Educators
www.ICE-UFT.org www.ICEUFTBlog.blogspot.com

UFT Elections Are Coming:

Why We Must Say NO to Weingarten/Unity Caucus-New Action

The UFT has not stood up against the closing of schools
The Department of Education can no longer be allowed to mismanage and inadequately fund schools and then close them, displacing students and staff, even when consultants hired by the DOE give schools like Tilden HS in Brooklyn proficient ratings in quality reviews. Randi Weingarten’s Unity Caucus (her political party) has put up no real opposition and has in fact cooperated with the DOE. ICE calls for a moratorium on closing schools were watered down by Unity. The giveback-laden 2005 contract gave away preferred placement rights for UFT members, eliminating Article 18G5 that gave members “the broadest possible placement choices available within the authority of the Board.” Hundreds of experienced teachers were forced to become day-to-day subs. UFT leaders actually branded this as an “improvement” along with the Open Market Plan (which leaves all choice in the hands of principals).

Weingarten/Unity still refuse to oppose mayoral control of NYC schools
ICE has called for the end of Mayoral Control when the law (giving the mayor full unchecked authority over the schools) sunsets in 2009. Weingarten backed the law change that allowed the Mayor to assume control of the schools and the UFT passively sat by as a system without checks and balances, ran amuck, ignoring views of both parents and educators. When Bloomberg needed a waiver to get a lawyer appointed as Chancellor, Weingarten was silent. When privateer Christopher Cerf was recently brought in to continue the attack on public education, again silence. We need to get politicians out of education and set up a new system that truly gives power to teachers at the school level. Weingarten/Unity rejected our position, instead, creating a committee that will examine all forms of school governance, including the possible renewal of Mayoral Control. An honest poll of members would show an overwhelming rejection of mayoral control.

Lower class size must be priority contract demand
Teachers list class size as a number one working condition priority. NYC has the highest class sizes in the state, if not the nation. The only protection teachers have had for 40 years has been the contracts negotiated in the early 1970’s, before the UFT changed its policy. Yet, Weingarten-Unity-New Action refuse to make this a contract negotiating demand, using the bogus excuse that money would be taken from salary increases (note how prep periods and other basics like health care are never tied to salary). Weingarten throws up smoke screens with petition drives (twice so far and more to come) for referendums to lower class sizes, knowing full well this tactic is subject to the mayor’s veto, with virtually no chance of reaching voters.

New Action is a phony opposition group in bed with Unity
New Action had been the oldest “opposition” group in the UFT until they began to give uncritical support for Weingarten, even endorsing her in this election. New Action is claiming their alliance with Weingarten allows them to influence UFT policies but they can’t cite a single gain other than for themselves in getting New Action’s entire leadership on the union payroll. Their latest leaflet proclaims, “President Weingarten changed a forty year policy of excluding opposition caucuses from having a voice in the UFT. She opened the door and New Action opted to enter.” How can New Action call itself an opposition when it no longer opposes Unity policy? And if they support Unity, why not just run on the Unity slate instead of as a separate entity? Weingarten cannot tolerate even a few critics on the Executive Board and is using New Action in an attempt to replace the only legitimate opposition voices from ICE-TJC. No party should be allowed to monopolize power for half a century. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely and the Unity/New Action alliance epitomizes a corrupt system.

Contract givebacks extended through 2009 while salary does not keep up with inflation
Weingarten gave away many hard-fought rights (seniority, hall patrol, grievance procedures, etc.) in the 2005 contract for salary increases (much of which were time for money swaps) that didn’t even keep up with NY area inflation. In addition, NYC’s 190-day school year is the longest of any district in the Metropolitan area. A raise is when you get more money for doing the same job instead of accepting whatever DC 37 negotiates with the city and saying “me too.” We need to organize a strong militant membership aligned with other unions so we are the ones to set the pattern on our terms.

Democratic reforms are needed to repair the UFT
Unity Caucus has controlled our union since 1960. Absolute power breeds an unhealthy climate for the kinds of decisions needed by a dynamic union to fight the attacks on public education and unions. Unity’s major interest is in holding onto power so that they may augment their own salaries and privileges at the expense of the working conditions and salaries of working teachers. ICE supports: election of divisional vice presidents (academic high schools, vocational high schools, middle schools, elementary schools) by the teachers in that division instead of by all the members, including retirees (who make up over 1/3 of the members) and reinstitution of elections for District Representatives. Dues increases should be subject to vote by members.

Weingarten/Unity Caucus/New Action have:

• given away seniority rights and weakened tenure protections
• not been able to stop the wave of micromanagement
• allowed massive erosion of the contract
• stood by while the ability of UFT members to fight harassment withers
• allowed an emasculated grievance procedure
• allowed a longer day/year (37.5 minute small group periods in most schools/ 2 days in August)
• still not delivered on promised 55/25 retirement plan

Vote the ICE-TJC Slate in the Upcoming UFT Elections

ICE-TJC Officers (AdCom) (CL: Chapter Leader, D: Delegate)

President Kit Wainer - Goldstein HS, (CL)
Secretary Camille Johnson - Humanity & Arts (D)
Ass’t Secty Ellen Schweitzer - Stuyvesant (CL)
Treasurer Marilyn Beckford - Hillcrest HS (CL)
Ass’t Treas. Yelena Siwinski - PS 193K (CL)
VP Elem. Lisa North – PS 3K (CL)
VP Middle Josh Kahn – MS 443 K (D)
VP HS Arthur Colen – FDR HS (CL)
VP Spec. Ed Joseph Wisniewski - PS 163 (D)
Voc. HS Gerard Frohnhoefer - Aviation HS (CL)
VP At-Large Ellen Fox – Ret.
[Schweitzer and Colen are current Ex. Bd members and Fox served for yrs.]

ICE: P.O. Box 1143, Jamaica, NY 11421 Phone: (917) 992-3734
On the web: www.ICE-UFT.org www.ICEUFTBlog.blogspot.com
I would like to:
____Contribute to the ICE (Make checks out to Independent Community of Educators) $_____
____Distribute election literature at my school # of copies________
____Run on the ICE-TJC slate in the election
____Contribute to the election campaign

Name___________________________________ School__________________________
Email___________________________________ Phone___________________________ HomeAddress____________________________________________________________________

Don’t Forget to Vote by Arthur Goldstein

Guest columnist

It’s UFT election time again, and we’re all pretty busy.

In schools, that means a whole lot of flyers telling us who to vote for. Basically there are three slates—Unity, New Action, and ICE-TJC, a coalition of the Independent Coalition of Educators and Teachers for a Just Contract. And election time is now, so I’ve read all of them. They’re not much different from the things you get in the mail when your friendly local politicians want jobs.

Who are these folks? No one denies Unity is the big dog in this race. Every UFT President has been a member of Unity, and the invitation-only Unity Caucus has dominated the UFT, well, forever. New chapter leaders are offered free trips to conventions and recruited. They then sign an application, which specifically states that members will “express criticism of caucus policies within the Caucus” and “support the decisions of Caucus / Union leadership in public or Union forums.” Critics call it a loyalty oath.

In his book The Teacher Rebellion, former AFT President David Selden writes, “Its decisions must be followed by the members in every detail. Several members have been expelled because the opposed the Vietnam War or were not supportive enough of the union’s opposition to community control.” Albert Shanker, the UFT’s first President, was one Tough Liberal indeed.

There are tangible benefits to joining Unity. On the lowest rung of the ladder, you could go to conventions. When I became a UFT delegate a few years back, a teacher told me, “You know, I’d like to become a delegate.”

“Really?” I asked. “I’m surprised. I didn’t think you were interested in union politics.”

“I’m not,” he said. “I just want to go to the conventions.”

That wasn’t the best way to earn my support, but at the time, he may have known union politics better than I did—he’s got Unity buddies.

The oldest opposition party is called New Action. When I started teaching I voted for them. Their pamphlets made it clear they were outsiders, and that appealed to me. Unity put out particularly nasty flyers, calling them “No Action,” which I found juvenile. From what I heard around the lunchroom, they had no chance of winning anyway, so I figured what the hell, and voted for them. They did have a few seats on the UFT’s policy-making Executive Board, mostly representing high schools, and for a while even junior high schools.

Soon after I started teaching (in 1984), they surprised everyone and took the High School Academic Vice Presidency. After Mike Shulman won, Unity forced a revote in which Shulman won by an even larger margin. After Shulman failed to be re-elected in the next election, they forced a rule change. High school teachers no longer select the High School Academic Vice-President. Now, not only all teachers, but also home day care workers, the administrative law judges and other non teachers, including retirees living it up in Boca Raton, vote for all vice-presidents. It’s kind of like having Oklahoma and Texas help New York choose representatives—the results became much more predictable.

In 2003, New Action made a deal with Unity. They would no longer oppose the Unity presidential candidate, and Unity would no longer oppose them for the six high school seats on the UFT Executive Board, seats New Action had won by narrow margins time and again. They couldn't resist this sure bet. Also, New Action leaders, for the first time, were given union jobs.

Some members of New Action, disenchanted with this move, left to join a group of non-affiliated activists to form the Independent Community of Educators, or ICE. In 2004, they teamed up with another caucus, Teachers for a Just Contract (TJC). They defeated New Action and took high school seats that Unity had not opposed. This resulted in the unspeakable—unapproved minority representation in the UFT Executive Board. Though this represented only 6 seats of 89, even that was unacceptable. The Unity Caucus didn’t want to be pestered by Executive Board members James Eterno and Jeff Kaufman—as they vigorously opposed things like the 2005 contract, merit pay, and mayoral control. It’s so much easier to run an organization without meddlesome dissenters—ask Mayor Bloomberg.

To make sure this wouldn’t happen again, Unity cross-endorsed New Action candidates in the 2007 election. Though ICE/ TJC outpolled New Action 3 to 1 in high schools, New Action won several Executive Board seats representing high schools while ICE/TJC got none. Clearly, the Unity cross-endorsement had paid off.

ICE/TJC is running a slate including presidential candidate James Eterno, Jamaica’s UFT chapter leader, and former UFT executive board member. (Full disclosure—I’m running for the UFT’s Executive Board representing high schools.) ICE/ TJC now seems to receive the all the love that used to be reserved for New Action, largely characterized as perpetual naysayers. It’s true we oppose the appeasement of anti-teacher, anti-union demagogues like Mayor Bloomberg and Joel Klein—but that’s because it’s been repeatedly proven not to help us.

Still ICE/ TJC supports a lot of things—a fair contract, placement for teachers whose schools close, democracy in NYC as well as the UFT, and a driven chapter leader named James Eterno for UFT President. We support transparency. We support teachers, guidance counselors, secretaries, and paraprofessionals. We support working people and the future of the teaching profession.

We support union, a strong union that stands up and fights those who baselessly attack us in the media. We support fighting fire with fire, speaking truth to power, and using the power of the UFT for something more productive than creating cute little cartoons that air during the Today show.

We are writers, thinkers, and doers. We are real live activists, who don’t need to organize an advisory committee or ask permission before demonstrating in front of Mayor Bloomberg’s house. When there’s a fire, we’re not on our Blackberries emailing Randi Weingarten for directions before we evacuate. We act in the interests of working teachers, and we don’t fret over whether or not it will get us invited to the next convention or gala luncheon. We are proactive, not reactive.

We don’t believe in buying dear and selling cheap. We don’t believe in giving up everything but the kitchen sink for an extra point. We don’t believe in selling out new teachers by promising three percent of their salaries to Mayor Bloomberg for an extra 17 years. We don’t believe in dumping every gain we made over twenty years for a few points above the pattern. Nor do we believe in negotiating a ten percent compensation increase for ten percent more work and calling it a raise.

We hope teachers vote, and we hope they think carefully before doing so. The machine is getting a little creaky.

It’s time for new blood.

UFT Elections: Winning the High Schools - Part 1

While MORE/NA won the high schools, let's not jump for joy and call it a smashing victory, as Kit Wainer points out in this deep analysis of the election:

In the High Schools MORE/New Action’s vote share [from their combined 2013 totals] actually declined slightly from roughly 54% to roughly 51%. It is difficult to know how Solidarity/Portelos votes would have gone had they not been on the ballot.

Read Kit's important insights,  not all of which I agree with, at

morecaucusnyc

2016 UFT election results: Some Good News, But A Great Deal Of Work Still To Do
With the Solidarity vote added to the MORE/NA totals we would have held our own from 2013 - remember - the NA votes in 2013 went to Unity. We could just as easily lost if Unity had managed to bring out just 300 more votes.

So despite all the work I describe below and will describe in the rest of this series - we held steady. But I contend we would would not have won if it were not for the efforts of a few people- and the New Action alliance.

What changed between 2013 and 2016? Eterno and Goldstein and Schirtzer and alliance with New Action -- Keys to MORE HS Victory

I touched on some of this yesterday

#MORE2016 UFT Elections: My High School Predictions On the Money As MORE Victory Costs Me Money

but I want to go into this in more depth:

In 2013 Arthur Goldstein, CL of Francis Lewis HS, one of the largest high school voting block in the city, did not run with MORE - he was never asked - my responsibility since I was his contact in MORE and didn't think he wanted to run because I had the impression after the 2010 election when he did run that he would run when we had a shot at winning and in 2013 there was no chance given the New Action/Unity alliance. Arthur didn't endorse MORE until the very end and did not do a GOTV campaign in his school. I bet we got very few votes from FL in 2013.

In 2016 the situation was reversed- In July 2015 Arthur said he would run and promised an energetic and enthusiastic campaign in his school. And so he did. He strongly advocated for an alliance with New Action as a key to winning.

I would bet at least half our margin of victory came from his school alone. While Arthur has not been a core member of MORE and has been a critic at times, there was no doubt in my mind that without him we could not win the high schools. We know that Arthur does not believe in loyalty oaths and has to be a free agent on the Ex Bd but he promised to support any MORE initiatives unless he felt it might go against a core belief. Arthur could not get on the Ex Bd without the MORE caucus and MORE's major chance at winning came from having Arthur on the slate. Arthur had proven himself as a relentless campaigner when he ran against Andy Palotta for NYSUT VP on the Stronger Together slate in the 2014 state elections. This arrangement was a win-win for Arthur and MORE.

Read his piece at NYCEducator on what the victory means for all of us: More/ New Action Victory Is a Win-Win

The other key factor was James Eterno's passion to win this one - one more win in case he should decide to retire in the next few years - though that is not currently on his agenda - but as an ATR, which he became in 2014, we know the jeopardy he faces.


Due to the closing of Jamaica HS where James was the chapter leader, he had contacts in high schools all over the city. He also had his own personal distribution list to many high schools all over Queens and he worked those contacts. I would bet that the other half of the victory votes came from the relentless work James has done over the past year.

Then there is Mike Schirtzer, whose school, Leon Goldstein, probably did not add to our totals from 2013 since with Kit Wainer there too it was a lock for MORE in both elections. But what Mike did was take the leadership of the group advocating for a win in the high schools. He lobbied MORE relentlessly to make this victory happen (some were not as enthusiastic and I will get into their reasons in the followups).

Mike, Arthur, James and I formed a team to spearhead things by starting a high school committee with a newsletter called High School Forum, at first informally, 16 months ago. MORE was struggling to emerge from its troubles and we decided not to wait because if we wanted to win the high schools we had to start in early 2015 and could not afford to wait for MORE to heal.

-----
Part 2 will go into more depth on the winding road - how we initially planned how to win even if New Action didn't switch and how we chose our candidates in the maelstrom of MORE internal politics. Let's not forget -- without the 450 New Action HS votes flipping from Unity to us we are not even in the ball game. One key to our strategy was reaching out to New Action.

Make sure to read Schirtzer's analysis: Mike Schirtzer on Why and How MORE Won the High Schools

And Jonathan Halabi of New Action: Deciding not to Vote in UFT Elections – A Rational Choice?

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:

Eterno Reports on Unity Rejection of rights for ATRs, Some history and video of the Nov 2008 Wine and Cheese ATR Rally

In the end a couple of the New Action people voted with the ATRs while the remainder of the New Action representatives and the Unity rubber stampers all voted with Barr and Ross against the ATRs having equal voting rights... James Eterno, ATRS GET PLENTY OF SUPPORT BUT NOT FROM UFT OFFICIALS, posted on ICE blog

It's hard for me to believe this report that some New Action EB members did not vote for the ATRs. Maybe James didn't see them cowering in the corners. (One of the really good guys in New Action, retiree Doug Haynes did support them.) Good I wasn't there because I would have confronted them. Well, this reaffirms the strong decision made by MORE to have nothing to do with New Action until they renounce their dirty deal with Mulgrew - which they won't. That their reps on the EB didn't support this unanimously is outrageous - word is that New Action leaders Shulman and Halabi voted with leadership. Shulman and Halabi called for liaisons in the borough offices as opposed to elected reps.

So typical of New Action - watch in the next election, where they will have Mulgrew at the top of their ticket, they will brag about how they support ATRs. Portelos was at the meeting last night -- let's see what he says about his pals in New Action refusing to support the ATRs.

MORE put up a reso last fall at the DA calling for the ATR chapter and were chastised by New Action leaders for not consulting them or doing it strategically. Charlatans have been selling alliances with New Action and promising that New Action would use its seats on the board to support ATRs - and other issues. (Maybe a reso at the Ex Bd or the DA calling on the UFT to actually support discontinued teachers instead of holding bogus rallies?)

When ATRs were created, ICE had James Eterno and Jeff Kaufman on the Ex Bd and they stood up strong against the creation of ATRs - the strongest voices opposed. Luckily, New Action did not have EB members in those years.

I know some people will be pissed at me for what I have to say below - but --

I would like to head to the AFT for an appeal. Is anybody with me?....Eterno

ATRs rally at Tweed - Nov. 2008 - it should have been at the UFT

Well, I guess going to the AFT to have Randi rule on this would make some people happy. Sorry, James, I'm not into the Einstein def of insanity -- doing the same thing over again and expecting different results. Maybe having the AFT reject this will make a few political points - but to whom?

While I generally support James Eterno, I don't agree with legal action without street action to back it up. There's a lot more to fight for for ATRs than just having their own chapter. It would be a first step in asserting their rights -- but to me, how many ATRs are in a position to be willing to assert their rights?

I believe that once the charter cap is lifted and Farina starts combining more schools, there will be even more ATRs coming. Will they disappear into some vapor?

Here's my challenge to the the leaders of the ATRs. Go out and find every ATR you can and create a functioning organization. I used to hand out leaflets directed at ATRs with a meeting announcement at the DA asking the CLs to give them to the ATRs in their school. People actually showed up at some of these meetings through these leaflets. (We did this with rubber room people and called for a rally that the Unity/UFT leadership coopted.)

Show up at the UFT with a couple of hundred people and surround the building. If there are ----- whatever the number of ATRS there are --- where are they when it comes to political action? I imagine a batch showed up yesterday at the Ex Bd -- still not enough people willing to engage in this battle.

ATRs go to so many schools. Are they educating people about how the union is run? Are they making contact with people in all these schools as a way to develop a ground game for the opposition? Maybe I'm missing something, but what I hear is mostly silence, except from a few people. First create a real organization of ATRS.

Angel Gonzalez and I tried to create such an organization through GEM in 2010-11 - I kept a detailed list of ATRS and emailed them regularly. We had gone to hiring halls with leaflets and set up meetings as an organizing tactic -- Angel has a PhD in how to organize people -- it is not though legalisms or social media. It takes boots on the ground. I called a meeting and over 40 people showed up and 25 showed to a follow-up. Then some sniping at me started and I decided I was not going to get into the weeds and withdrew my organizing activities, which frankly took a hell of a lot of time.

The response from other people was almost funny. The original ATR organizers viewed our actions as a threat. And TJC tried to set up its own competing ATR group. Perfect examples of why Unity will always win.

ATRs in the past - the initial batch - seemed more militant.

In Nov. 2008, Marjorie Stamberg and John Powers organized ATRs and created an event that shook both the UFT and the DOE. The problem was that they let it die that day - like the demo was the end game. That abandonment led Angel and I to create an ICE ATR committee that turned into GEM.

Now here is some ATR power -- 6 years ago in 2 parts. Just the threat of this rally forced the UFT and DOE into some contract agreement and the UFT tried to kill this rally by holding a wine and cheese event at the UFT - and managed to lure people over there -- including the New Action people - of course -- look for some of them in the video.

Part 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Ac-Ul1m8-0 - posted Jan, 2009.

On November 24, 2008, teachers without positions, known as ATRs, held a rally at Tweed. They had forced the UFT to endorse the rally but in the interim the UFT signed an agreement with the DOE. The leadership called for an information meeting at UFT HQ, a mile away at the very same time the rally was due to start. Mass confusion. I taped the UFTHQ while David Bellel did the rally. The back story is how desperate UFT leaders were to suppress the tape I made. In fact, today at the Delegate Assembly they will pass a gag rule to try to prevent future embarrassment.
MAKE SURE TO SEE PART 2: The SLOW March Up Broadway - where Randi tried to convince me to give her my tape.



Part 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hG4xrbgiGqU - Posted Jan. 28, 2009

On November 24, 2008, teachers without positions, known as ATRs, held a rally at Tweed. They had forced the UFT to endorse the rally but in the interim the UFT signed an agreement with the DOE. The leadership called for an information meeting at UFT HQ, a mile away at the very same time the rally was due to start. Mass confusion. I taped the UFTHQ while David Bellel did the rally. The back story is how desperate UFT leaders were to suppress the tape I made. In fact, today at the Delegate Assembly they will pass a gag rule to try to prevent future embarrassment.



Why can the UFT reject these appeals for a chapter for ATRS? Because they can.

Here is James' compete report from last night's meeting.

http://iceuftblog.blogspot.com/2015/05/atrs-get-plenty-of-support-but-not-from.html

ATRS GET PLENTY OF SUPPORT BUT NOT FROM UFT OFFICIALS

A fairly strong contingent of Absent Teacher Reserves and our supporters were at the UFT Executive Board last night.  I was given the honor to represent the ATRs and Leave Replacement Teachers as we made the case for having a UFT Chapter with representatives of our own choosing.

Leroy Barr and lawyer Adam Ross represented the UFT and they made what all consider a case that was laughable at best and truly pathetic at worst.  They claimed that ATRs have an equal chance of winning elections at schools that some of us just got to today. In addition, when we are moved to the next school, they both said with a straight face that we can still be the Chapter Leader for the school we are just passing through this May.  The audience of ATRs and our friends just chuckled and had to be told to be quiet.

In the end a couple of the New Action people voted with the ATRs while the remainder of the New Action representatives and the Unity rubber stampers all voted with Barr and Ross against the ATRs having equal voting rights.

As one observer put it: ATRs have democratic rights on paper but not in reality.

I would like to head to the AFT for an appeal. Is anybody with me?

  Executive Board Appeal

May 4, 2015 

My name is James Eterno; I am a Temporary Leave Replacement Teacher at Middle College High School in Queens but with no permanent assignment.

I’m here tonight because there are many union members who happen to be Absent Teacher Reserves, Leave Replacement Teachers or Temporary Provisional Teachers have no chapter and therefore are being denied fundamental democratic union rights that are guaranteed in federal labor law. 

Pretend you are on a business trip to Hawaii for a month or even a little longer.  Do you think you should have a right to vote for who the governor of Hawaii should be since you happened to be there on Election Day? 

Do you think you should be eligible to run for governor of Hawaii because you happened to be in the state on Election Day? 

Both of these situations are completely ridiculous.  But this is basically the kind of chapter election system for ATRs the leadership of this union proposed and this Executive Board recently approved in the Chapter Election Guide and Bylaws for this spring’s elections. 

ATRS and Leave Replacement Teachers vote at the school we are just passing through in May even if the school has an election in June and we are no longer there. That violates the federal law. 

ATRs, Leave Replacement Teachers and Temporary Provisional Teachers are supposed to run for chapter leader or delegate from those same schools we are just passing through this May. This is absurd and also flies in the face of the federal law. 

Since the Delegate Assembly is the highest policy-making body in the union, it must be elected.  This is what the Landrum Griffin Federal Regulations say concerning eligibility to be candidates and to hold union office: 

Every member in good standing is eligible to be a candidate and to hold office subject to reasonable qualifications in the union’s constitution and bylaws that are uniformly imposed. 

  

Is it a reasonable qualification that if I want to serve as a delegate or chapter leader, I have to run for office in a school where I have absolutely no right to a job in that school when my term of office would begin in July? Past union policy has been that once a person is removed permanently from a school they are no longer the chapter leader, particularly after 3020a cases are settled and a person becomes an ATR.  That is why Mr. Portelos is no longer chapter leader at his school.   

Is there now a change in policy where people can serve as chapter leader if they no longer are in a school? That might help to stop vindictive principal excessing of our chapter leaders but if that is the new policy, I would like to know why Mr. Portelos is not chapter leader at his former school and why he can’t run again there?  

The whole policy of us voting in schools we are just passing through makes a mockery of democracy.  Remember, federal regulations say qualifications have to be reasonable and uniformly imposed.  Clearly the regular members of a chapter have an automatic advantage over ATRs in chapter elections.  That is not reasonable and certainly not a uniformly imposed regulation. 

In the past we were always told that ATRs can’t get our own chapter because we don’t want to institutionalize and thus accept what is a temporary position.  This argument was always weak but now it is completely mistaken because the UFT embedded a whole Section 16 into the contract that concerns ATRS. We have weaker due process rights; we are compelled to go on interviews, some for jobs which don’t exist and we are forced to resign if we happen to not check our emails and miss two interviews.  Due process be damned for ATRS.  Some even can be denied interviews by the Chancellor.  (Now with out of time schools coming, a new category is being created that looks like year to year ATRs.)  We are embedded. There is even a temporary group of teachers that was recently assigned to a chapter; Peer Validators. They exist in the contract for only two years and yet they were sent to the teachers assigned chapter.  Only ATRs are constantly told no. 

ATRS/Leave Replacement and Temporary Provisional teachers have been asking for almost a decade for our own chapter with a chapter leader and delegates to deal with our unique status.  I don’t know too many executive board members who have walked in our shoes. Functional chapters such as the guidance counselors use the chapter leader in the building they are at and then can call on their own elected central guidance chapter leader and delegates when needed for unique guidance issues.  Several categories of teachers including teachers assigned and teachers of the home-bound have their own chapter leader too.  If you continue to insist the temporary nature of the position is a problem, we have a solution:  We can put in the bylaws that we will dissolve the ATR chapter if all of the temporary provisional, leave replacement and atr teachers are placed. We can even make it one of our goals. The citywide Ed Evaluator chapter was dissolved.  We too can be dissolved if some sanity returns to the Board of ed and we no longer exist.

As for this evening, without wanting to show any disrespect, I was told that Leroy Barr was chosen to make the report on our election complaint.  Leroy spoke passionately against an ATR chapter in October at the DA and he rejected my arguments in November when we met for our equal voting rights. His lack of objectivity on this subject presents a conflict of interest. 

I would like to close by asking an important question: If this body rejects our very reasonable request for fair voting rights and equal rights to serve in office for ATRS, Leave Replacement Teachers and Temporary Provisional teachers, then we will go up the ladder to the AFT who we have already contacted and then to the Department of Labor who I have spoken to and they are interested in our case. Some, not me, are going to go to PERB too.  The UFT is going to waste a large amount of time, money and effort fighting against its own members because we want to vote and serve in office in the same way as everybody else. Ten or twenty delegates and a chapter leader won’t make much of a dent in any caucus majority at the DA so why is anyone afraid of us?  We want to have the same voting rights and rights to hold office as all other UFT members. Save that money, time and effort by giving us fair democratic rights.  Create a chapter for us tonight.