It is unprecedented in the history of the Chicago Teachers Union for major union officers to return to teaching after having served at the "top" of the CTU. In addition to Lynch, former vice president Howard Heath (now at Lane Tech High School), former treasurer Maureen Callaghan (now a clerk at Gage Park) and former Recording Secretary Jacqueline Price Ward (now teaching library at Marquette Elementary) are all back at schools. Financial Secretary James Alexander, who had taught at Carver Area High School before his 2001 election, retired after leaving office in August. Lynch has continued her opposition to mayoral policies with the union and in Op Ed pieces submitted to and published in the newspapers.

Still turmoil within the union

While the CTU continued presenting a militant face to the public and the school board, factionalism and attempts by Stewart to undermine hard-won democratic gains initiated by the Lynch administration continue to be the order of the day within the union itself. The monthly meetings of the House of Delegates have been even more tumultuous than they were in the early days of the Lynch administration. The two major political caucuses within the union remain the United Progressive Caucus (UPC) headed by Stewart and Dallas, and the ProActive Chicago Teachers and school workers (PACT) caucus, headed by Lynch. Democracy got kicked to the curb as the "New UPC" took over the Chicago Teachers Union, despite their campaign promises to expand democracy. The September House of Delegates meeting saw heavy security at both doors of Plumbers Hall on 1340 West Washington Blvd. Security stopped delegates from entering through the closest doors from the parking lot, a great inconvenience to many. Security also kicked out those with leaflets and newspapers from the lobby to the street, telling them that literature could no longer be distributed in the lobby where it had always been distributed before. The Pledge of Allegiance was no longer said at the beginning of the meeting. Seats around microphone one were reserved for AFT and IFT guests, making it difficult for delegates to get to mike one to ask questions. The meeting notice for the September meeting put the pre-meeting question period 15 minutes earlier at 3:45 p.m., when many teachers and other staff couldn't get there in time, especially as many schools were letting out 15 minutes later. When I asked why, I was told it was a misprint.

Substance editor George N. Schmidt joined the pickets led by SEIU outside the Board of Education before the board’s October 27 meeting. Schmidt noted that for the first time in Chicago history all of  the members of the city’s school board are millionaires thanks to the mayor’s appointments of business rather than educational leaders to the board. Despite the fact that Marilyn Stewart has tried to deprive Schmidt of membership in the Chicago Teachers Union (dating back to 1969), Schmidt continues the be active in union affairs.  (Substance photo by Millicent Militant).

However, the official question period during the meeting itself was also seemingly sabotaged when two presenters of extremely sensitive topics—one on the AFT pronouncement on the fraud in the union election, and the other on the medical insurance mess the Board had created—were not given question periods of their own after the presentations as is only right and customary. So the official 15-minute question period long held sacred by delegates as the only time they could conduct real union business was dominated this meeting by frantic and often very personal-situation-oriented questions on the medical quagmire. The new officers played out the clock that way.

  When next the items for action came up and there was a call for a quorum, the quorum count would have shown there were not enough delegates in the house to vote on these matters. President Marilyn Stewart ignored the repeated calls for quorum, and pretended to conduct votes on the two items listed on the agenda. It was not clear in the bedlam that followed, with delegates leaving the hall in disgust, who was voting or how they voted. In a similar way, Stewart rammed through an item not on the agenda, and not discussed in the delegates meeting notice, which was to endorse two UPC candidates for the pension fund trustee election. She pretended that a vote to close debate was a vote for the endorsement.

Contrary to what was claimed by some of the more rabid factionalists in the Chicago Teachers Ünion, the protests against Renaissance 2010 and cutbacks were begun under the Lynch administration. Above (left to right) Allen Bearden, Deborah Lynch, Josephine Perry, and Jay Rehak picket at the Board of Education’s June 23, 2004 meeting. The meeting took place prior to the mayor’s announcement of the “Renaissance 2010” plan, which Lynch also opposed. After Lynch lost the union presidency, Bearden (who had been director of the CTU Quest Center) and Rehak (who had been the union’s publicity chief)  lost their union jobs. Perry, a classroom teacher, had been active on many union committees. When she asked recently why she hadn’t been reappointed to them, Marilyn Stewart’s aide Diana Scheffer told the House of Delegates that Perry was a “trouble maker”, and example of the ongoing factionalism being practiced by the United Progressive Caucus.   (Substance photo by George Schmidt).

Poltrock causing greater controversies than necessary?

The October meeting saw delegates trying to correct the minutes of the September meeting to show that no valid votes occurred after the quorum call, but Lawyer Larry Poltrock whose law firm made millions from the union when the old UPC was in power and who was now back in business (with his daughter now also hired) stated that each meeting was an entity unto itself and we could not make changes on the previous meeting. Far-fetched? Why, yes. Why then do the delegates vote to accept the minutes?

A great mike fight ensued to make null and void anything past the calls for quorum ignored in the September meeting, but it soon became obvious that the new UPC officers had suspended Roberts Rules of Order, the parliamentary procedures always followed in the past, and felt they could get away with it. Rogue power was the order of the day. Past President Deborah Lynch has written the AFT to point out how union monies were spent to promote these "endorsed" partisan candidates when the House hadn't voted to do so.

Tony Gudwien made a motion for a rally against Renaissance 2010, and though it looked like his motion won, the tellers said it lost. A delegate calling for a standing vote made the mistake of asking for a recount instead of "calling for division" so his intent was laughed off. In this way the officers and their lawyer who acts as parliamentarian typically thwart and subvert the intentions of the delegates, instead of doing their job of helping the duly elected delegates to achieve their purpose.

I tried to give the two incumbent candidates who had not been endorsed, Rose Mary Finnegan and Patricia Knazze, as well as the "endorsed" candidates, the opportunity at this meeting to have a minute each to present their credentials to the House. First, Ted Dallas told me to bring it up in New Business when I asked how best I could accomplish my purpose. When I realized that would be too late for the House to hear these candidates before the vote by mail-in ballot later in the month, I tried to make an earlier motion to ensure that they could speak at this meeting.

Because I began with "Since I've realized...", they claimed I had already spoken to my motion and therefore I couldn't make it. They would have had to accept "Whereas". I should have appealed the ruling of the Chair. When I rose later to bring it up for New Business, the UPC Sergeant-at-Arms Anita Burke slipped to the mike she was guarding, smiled at me, and moved to adjourn the meeting. This tactic frequently occurs before New Business can take place.

Trickery on pension trustees backfired

By the November meeting it was clear that the trickery exercised by the new officials of the union regarding the so-called endorsement of their UPC candidates had backfired. The results of the election were in, but were never mentioned by the officers in their reports. The incumbents Knazze and Finnegan had won, despite the union dues money spent by the officers to promote their candidates whom the house had never voted to endorse.

My question at the mike this meeting was why they had put the distributors of literature out in the cold when the officers themselves prior to their ascendancy had always been allowed to pass out their literature in the lobby. Stewart said that the directive had only been for the September meeting. I'm glad I asked.

One notable event occurred later when Josephine Perry spoke at the mike asking why after serving for years on certain union committees, she had not been appointed this year. At the October meeting, she had been told that the president and one of the coordinators, Diana Sheffer, were still working on the appointments.[The truth of the matter is that while Lynch had appointed UPC members and had kept the UPC field reps, appointments and jobs were now no longer non-partisan.] However, the bizarre occurred here when Sheffer rose to a mike to tell Perry she had not been appointed because she was a  "trouble-maker." Stewart told Sheffer she was out of order, letters of apology have been sent to Perry by both Stewart and Dallas, and the struggle was still continuing through the December meeting with no resolution yet in sight.

The rally against Renaissance 2010 was approved for November 12, but the event itself later showed that so little was done by the CTU to get people there that the numbers had to be puffed up. Thank goodness for the work of our coalition unions.

I was stopped from going to the visitor's balcony towards the very end of the meeting by Sergeant-at-Arms Roberta Wilson who refused to give me an explanation. She kept saying, "That way, Madame," as she pointed towards the doors. Between the doors and the stairs to the balcony was an elevator that took me up, but usually that elevator doesn't work, and she certainly didn't tell me I was to use the elevator. I have yet to get to the mike to ask a question about this Gestapo tactic.

Union must submit executive salaries to House of Delegates

President Stewart tickled our risibilities when she brought the December meeting to order by saying in effect that since the pre-meeting question period had started five minutes late, the official meeting would be started (what in actuality was) five minutes early—yet another question period curtailed.

Later I made a motion (permissible during the question period) to change the Delegates Workshop from the weekend before the Pulaski holiday because many had travel plans. Stewart said the House couldn't deal with my motion because hotel contracts had already been signed. Again Roberts Rules of Order were being disregarded. And, it showed that the House was being treated like a mere rubber stamp. Further in the agenda was the motion for the house to approve the cancellation of the March meetings in order to allow for the workshop. So the contracts had been signed before the House had approved any of this.

The remarkable event at this meeting was Devon Morales' success in having the House vote yes 233 to 99 to his motion that the union administration could sign no contract of $100,000 or more, without the prior approval of the House of Delegates. First, Stewart said the motion would be sent to committee, a statement within the rules. When Morales objected and wanted the House to deal with it now, as is also within the rules for the maker of the motion to object, Poltrock—who either never had it, or has lost it—said the motion had to go to committee.

Poltrock so incensed the delegates with this erroneous statement, that one told Poltrock that he didn't know what he was doing. When Poltrock told him that maybe then he wanted to come onto the stage (Poltrock likes to make offers about taking the fight outside), the delegate did to the laughter of the House. [Poltrock has also threatened critics with legal action using terms like "I'll have your house!" to people who question his ethics.]

The officers then said that the time was up on the 15-minute question period. When pandemonium erupted because a motion and the voting have always stopped the clock on the question period and there were many more questions the delegates still had the right to ask, Stewart went on to the Items for Action next on the agenda. And again the anger in the room led to calls for quorum which were ignored for pretend votes on the items listed, including the one regarding the Delegates Workshop on Pulaski weekend.

Visitors should come and see how business is conducted these days at these union meetings. Just bring your union card or dues-deduct stub.

It's usually the first Wednesday of every month at 4:00 p.m. Maybe Poltrock won't be answering as many questions as the officers have been allowing him to during the various question periods (besides his fine work as parliamentarian), but you can bet Gail Koffman, one knowledgeable person from the old Tom Reece administration and now Field Staff Coordinator, will continue to be asked to jump to the mike for all the questions the officers don't know how to answer.