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Past Issues September 2005 Scofflaw Union Chiefs Run Outlaw Meeting
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Page 1 of 2 By Theresa D. Daniels By the time the meeting was over, President Marilyn Stewart and her
team had broken most of the rules of parliamentary procedure, union
democracy, and civilized behavior.
[This had been done successfully by Stewart’s caucus, the UPC, in September, 2001, when then-President Deborah Lynch had come into office because they didn’t like the reductions in union officers’ and staff salaries and benefits attempted by the Lynch administration’s proposed austerity budget. The reason they gave, however, was that Lynch had reduced the amount of money for legal staff, and they alleged that services to union members would suffer. When back in office, they themselves reduced the amount designated for legal services as part of the bogus financial crisis they had concocted against Lynch, then went up a million dollars in the first budget they presented. However, they knew, as we all do, when they made the charge against Lynch’s budget, that the budget figure does not drive the services the members get, that when the need arises, the need is met. This is an example of the kind of short-term attack partisan politics creates: you charge the other guy with doing things you know you’ll have to do yourself.] Against all rules, Stewart ruled my motion out of order, and repeated the dictum that we would have one speaker for and one against. She said I could speak to the budget. I said I was speaking against this budget because there were so many unanswered questions. I said that since this meeting had begun a half-hour late (the delegates packets had gone missing), been dragged out so long (deliberately many felt), and was running so late, my motion to table the budget until a special meeting could be held to consider the budget carefully and to have questions about it answered should not have been ruled out of order. The House should have been able to vote my motion up or down as Roberts Rules of Order allow, I said. I went on to say that the budget, as presented to the delegates, blended all expenses, so that expenditures were not clear. No one had been allowed to see the contracts for the field representatives, the consultants (like lobbyist Pam Massarsky who reputedly has a three-year contract worth $600,000 on top of her pension, and who reportedly works mostly from home), the coordinators, the publicist(s), the attorneys, or the clerical staff who reputedly earn as much as $81,588. I said that the budget showed an increase of $600,000 in benefits for field staff, an increase of $200,000 for the office staff, and unlimited expense accounts which in the past included a travel allowance big enough to pay for the expensive cars of officers, coordinators, field representatives, and consultants. The only “contract” that Lou Pyster, Jan Morgan- Wulf, and Sandra Finkel had been shown was a generic summary of the officers’ contracts and it showed disability insurance, life insurance, and medical insurance paid in entirety for the officers, I continued. The medical was supposed to be the same as the members’, but no specifics were spelled out for medical co-pays or deductibles. An annuity was mentioned in the contract, but also not spelled out. [Prior UPC administrations had annuities of as much as 21% for officers and much of the staff, annuities paid for by our union dues as extra hidden salary for our union leaders. Lynch’s administration had eliminated the annuities. When mention is made to the current administration of a 21% annuity that they may have reinstituted, they do not deny it.] I said that the budget looked to be a reward for the winners of the election and that we couldn’t have an informed vote without a real discussion of the budget, as my motion to hold a special session had stated. (Please see my report in the June issue of Substance for more specifics regarding the budget.) Is it okay for union leaders to raid the union budget? The main thrust of Leslie Barron, delegate from Carnegie School and UPC trustee for the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU), who spoke for the budget to be accepted, was that if we wanted unity, what did we care about how much the officers made. She said, “Here we are about to die, and you’re concerned with this? It’s ridiculous.” Barron may be the one trustee of six who is not on the union payroll. The other five are on the payroll of the budget that they are charged to oversee, somewhat a conflict of interest, wouldn’t you say? They drank the kool-ade I say that if you believe that greed doesn’t corrupt union leaders, then you drank the kool-ade. You are a cult member. You are a true believer, tunnel-visioned, who will never question your leaders. You’ll either mindlessly or cynically go along with the party line and defend your leaders right or wrong (possibly while hoping, as in the case of quite a few, to benefit financially from your maybe not-so-blind loyalty). After your union dues pay for the officers’, field reps’, and others’ luxury cars due to a munificent transportation allowance, as it has in previous UPC administrations, don’t think that puts them in a frame of mind to do battle for you. It only makes them put their minds on how to get more of that filthy lucre for themselves and on how they can keep it. Witness the campaigning strategies and behaviors of this administration from day one. Union leaders can become self-aggrandizing crooks and opportunists who can’t pull our union out of the morass we’re in if they’re into the easy-greasy how-to-get-wealthier mode. This motivation is passed on to their supporters to whom they pass on jobs and perks. It makes the rest of us feel like chumps, rather than a part of a noble profession. We feel like we worked hard for little, and were abused by both the Board of Education and our union. Greed also leads corrupt union heads to selling out the union members and to making accommodations with the powerful, the mayor and business interests, accommodations not in the interest of the schools or the union members. Our union needs triage. We owe it to ourselves to make our leaders be the best human beings and best union leaders that they can be. Lou Pyster, former delegate and union director of research, now retired, said, “The House of Delegates must be the watchdog. We need to see the contracts of the union leaders and staff. They must stop the subterfuge and show us the actual contracts, just as the Bob Healey, Jacqui Vaughn, and Debbie Lynch administrations did, making the contracts an open book.” He added that even the Tom Reece administration did better than Stewart in revealing the contracts. “They flipped the vote count on the budget,” say those who counted as a double-check After a voice vote was judged by President Stewart to be unclear, a standing vote was conducted and it was clear to me and many others that the No votes against the budget had it. While standing stationary so as to register my own No vote, I counted the people voting No till I got to 203 and could no longer see clearly to finish counting the other side of the hall. My count of the Yes votes showed nothing approaching that number. I had to quit after 150 because I couldn’t see the few remaining on the other side of the hall. I did wonder as I was standing, if the vote would be reported accurately by the counters, as they are the sergeants-in-arms appointed by the UPC officers. Unlike the Lynch administration, the UPC did not appoint any from other caucuses. Then too, to whom do the counters of the different sections of the hall give their count? Yep, they give them to the officers on stage for their tabulation. I wondered if there was a mechanism we could put in place as a safeguard against partisan counting and final tabulation. I was hoping while standing that someone in the balcony was counting.
Luckily there was someone counting. Ron Kolar, a teacher from Curie High School and a former delegate, later came down from the visitors’ balcony to tell me and others that President Stewart in announcing the outcome had flipped the vote totals, that it was the No votes against the contract which should have won. She had said the opposite. He and another teacher had counted. Kolar said to me and to others, “They flipped the vote. The No’s had it.” I told him that that’s what I knew too.
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The Chicago Teachers Union House of Delegates
June meeting, held at Plumbers Hall, 1340 W. Washington Blvd., on June
1, 2005, was unlike any other conducted in my over-30 years of
attendance at these meetings. Dozens of other delegates told Substance
the same thing, both during the meeting and since, so this report is
offered in the context of that unprecedented reality. 
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