The CTU (Chicago Teachers Union) House of Delegates met at Plumbers Hall, 1340 West Washington Boulevard, on the usual first Wednesday of the month, December 7, 2005. [It should be noted here that the next meeting will be held on the second Wednesday, January 11, due to the school holidays. Also please note that the CTU newspaper lists an incorrect date — January 10 — on its back-page calendar.]

Parliamentary questions continue

Pam Massarsky, Tom Reece, and Diana Scheffer talk with CTU President Marilyn Stewart at the UPC party an hour after the June 1 delegates’ meeting. Substance photo by Theresa D. Daniels.

After the pre-meeting question-and-answer period beginning at 4:00 p.m., which is discussed more specifically later in this report, President Marilyn Stewart introduced the new parliamentarian, Barbara Hellman, previously a general counsel and parliamentarian to the IFT (Illinois Federation of Teachers) for almost forty years. To date, my phone calls to the Union officers and Hellman have not been returned, and I have not yet been able to learn why Hellman took over the parliamentarian duties of CTU Attorney Jennifer Poltrock. It remains unclear to what extent a parliamentarian can influence a recalcitrant administration to observe Roberts Rules of Order which ensure fairness and a voice to the delegates.

Union observers are hopeful that this means the parent organizations (the IFT and the national AFT, American Federation of Teachers) are paying attention to the complaints of delegates and Substance that parliamentary procedure — as embodied in Roberts Rules of Order — has been ignored by the Stewart administration at the House meetings, and that democracy has been stifled within the union.

Hellman has already earned her salary in my book. When at this meeting, Recording Secretary Mary McGuire, as always, again refused to allow delegates any means of making corrections to her minutes of the previous meeting, I protested. [Up until the previous meeting, the minutes McGuire had presented had been a copy of the previous meeting’s agenda, leading delegates to say that they felt like Alice in Wonderland at these meetings. Coupled with the fact that the union refuses to allow the members to have copies of the stenographic transcripts which are taken — at members’ expense — at each meeting, the problem is obvious.]

I protested without the benefit of a microphone. Under the Stewart administration, the mikes have been consistently moved out of reach during the officer reports and placed under the guard of sergeants-at-arms at the front wall of the hall so that delegates cannot have access to them. Though past practice and tradition had it that delegates could ask questions and even make motions after each report, the Stewart administration has pretended that the officers’ reports cannot be interrupted. “They seem afraid of delegate participation,” said Norine Gutekanst, delegate from Inter-American Elementary School.

Using my teacher voice, I asked how a correction to the minutes could be made. President Stewart ruled me out of order, though I asked for a decision from the new parliamentarian for a ruling on making corrections to the minutes.

Delegate Allegra Podrovsky of Kelvyn Park then gave the officers on stage written questions for the parliamentarian who acknowledged in writing that the Recording Secretary “should ask” for corrections to the minutes. Unfortunately, the parliamentarian advises the president only when the president asks for the advice of the parliamentarian. We’ll have to wait and see if President Stewart will utilize her new parliamentarian.

Run-off for H.S. ‘Functional Vice-President’

After the acknowledgement of school employees who had died recently, President Stewart asked for a special order of business in order to conduct a run-off election for High School Functional Vice-President between the two top vote-getters of four candidates at the election held at the November House meeting.

At the November meeting, Stewart had declared Alex Ilich (Kennedy High School) the “winner” of the November election, but former President Deborah Lynch fought to make a point of order at that meeting to say that the constitution and by-laws stated that the winner must have the majority of votes, not the mere plurality or the greatest number of votes, and that a run-off election must be held. Lynch had to call for the parliamentarian to allow her to make her point of order, because Stewart had again ruled her out of order.

(Ironically, if the majority vote were not necessary for winning an election, Lynch would now be union president as she had “won” the election in May, 2001, by the plurality or greatest number of votes, “losing” in the run-off election in June when the AFT declared for the Stewart administration. Albert Gore too won the plurality of the popular vote, but President George W. Bush was appointed after the United States Supreme Court awarded Florida’s electoral votes to Bush).

The other candidate in the December run-off election was Archie Moore, delegate from Collins High School. In his speech, he presented himself as someone who had always supported the union leadership when they were doing the right thing, but said he would “call them out” if they were taking actions against this House. Ilich, the UPC (Stewart’s United Progressive Caucus) candidate, said in his speech that Archie Moore was supported by the people who brought us “this,” and he held up the Board/Union contract book to the hoots of the UPC loyalists (the contract negotiated by the Lynch administration).

Ilich won by one vote, 47—46.

Miriam Socoloff, city-wide delegate, an Archie Moore supporter, missed the vote because she only finished teaching at 4:30 p.m., as did other Moore supporters who told me they had late schedules. Socoloff said that she wondered if that was why the election was held so early in the meeting so that teachers with late schedules could not make it in time to vote. Readers will remember that at the June meeting, when Deborah Lynch was running, the election was held late, after long reports. I wondered if UPC loyalists were told to be there early for the election no matter what their schedules.

Alex Ilich’s campaign literature distributed at the December meeting had no union bug or “labor donated” designation. Other UPC literature slamming Debbie Lynch on the pensionability issue, which was also distributed at this meeting, did not have a union bug or “labor donated” as well. Our unionists need to get some savvy about themselves on such union matters. Ironically, Stewart and company had made a big issue at a previous meeting and in the union newspaper about some CEEC (Chicago Educational Employees Caucus) literature which did not display the union bug.

Stewart’s Report goes light on “Strike!”

Only at the very end of her report did President Stewart mention the ultimate job action for which she said we must prepare ourselves. The “Strike!” theme had resonated loudly throughout her report of the previous month.

This night, she again gave an impassioned appeal for the victims of Katrina, saying that only $66,233 had been collected, and that if everyone gave five dollars (tax deductible, she said), the goal of $100,000 could be reached. Stewart gave examples of farcical glitches in the aid to the victims, and said, “Our government—Shame on them. Shame on them. You cannot abandon people in the United States who are still suffering.”

She raised the specter of the New Orleans school board laying off union members, with those who had family coverage losing their catastrophic medical insurance and having to pay out an initial $10,000 out of pocket for medical expenses. She said that the so-called “Recovery District Schools” were taking advantage of the tragedy, forcing union teachers to now apply for jobs at charter schools, with the federal government canceling all union contracts, taking us back to the early 1900s. She added that the NEA (the competing national union, the National Education Association) was raiding the AFT (the American Federation of Teachers) and also taking advantage of the situation.

President Stewart then spoke about what she called “our own disaster” — Mayor Daley’s union-busting and privatization moves and his giving away of public school buildings to charter schools. She talked about his talk of year-around schools because, he said, our children attended way less school than the kids in China. She said, however, that the mayor was putting no dollar signs to that talk and that Board President Michael Scott had acknowledged that there was no money for air conditioning. She noted that many school buildings do not even having windows that open, making it impossible to conduct classes during the hotter months. Stewart said she’d been through teaching reading outside “in the sprinkling system.” Some staff were leaving this meeting early in order to attend a “Renaissance 2010” (Ren10) meeting, she said.

Stewart reported that 90 percent of the ESP’s (educational support staff) who took test prep classes from the Quest Center passed the test required by NCLB (No Child Left Behind). She said that people who don’t pass the test by June, 2006, will lose their jobs, but that if you fail the test, you only have to re-take the part you failed.

She reported the grievances won by the field staff, including ESP’s laid off without regard to seniority (a right established by the present contract). She warned people to pay attention to job titles. Also, she said, three regular-appointed teachers denied summer school work in 2004 were paid due to a successful grievance. Stewart admonished teachers to know their rights under the contract.

Again Stewart lauded the “Fresh Start Program” which was part of a Board/Union agreement to help struggling schools. She talked about foundations and companies which were putting in money towards studies on whether Ren10 will work because there was widespread doubt about charter schools.

Stewart said that there was instability in the system, and that things were constantly being changed. She said, “We’re the most stable thing in the system. Mayors, governors, and presidents come and go.” She said everything was actually not new; it was just repackaged.

President Stewart announced a “Rally for America” at Haymarket Square the following late afternoon, and said that [the union-busters] were picking off our unions one by one. “Witness California,” she said. “You have to stand strong when they come for you.” She remembered again how her dad would always say, “My union, my union.” She said, “Our rights are being threatened and we know it. Unions are under attack. But we’re what’s right with America. It’s unions that got us the forty-hour week and the child labor laws.”

“Absolutely, we’re for working people,” Stewart said, adding that she didn’t think too many people here were living off trust funds. “Well, maybe a few, and working for a hobby,” she chuckled.

“When this contract is up,” she said, “We must prepare ourselves for the ultimate job action. It’s not the first choice. It’s not the first option. But you have to protect your rights that you fought for.” I’ve gone into some greater detail with Stewart’s speech, as in these dark days of union-busting it is good for the soul of every unionist to hear some stirring union words.

The pensionability “victory”

In her report, Stewart addressed the pensionability settlement and had Attorney Jennifer Poltrock speak to it. Poltrock did not mouth the UPC line on the settlement, but said, “There are conflicting reports as to what occurred between the years 2001 and 2004. She said that there was a question on whether the case was arbitrable after the moneys for 1999 were paid to all working members in 2001, with three years’ payment still due.

The Board had maintained that the payment distributed as a pensionable bonus to all school employees in a settlement worked out by former President Tom Reece right before the Union election of 2001 was for two years, not one year as the Lynch administration was later able to establish. The Board had spent nearly $11 million for that one-year settlement, with speculation rife that then-CEO Paul Vallas was trying to help Reece get re-elected.

Poltrock said this settlement covered the three years still not paid, with the moneys pushed backed into 2001, 2002, and 2003. She said that the teachers and paraprofessionals who worked pay period 12 would split the money,z which amounted to $6 million for each of the three years. The money would be paid in three different checks, she said. Cadre and substitute teachers would not be paid, she said, in accordance with how the money was distributed in 2001. There were 80,000 names, she said, with the list to be approved and solidified, and attempts made to reach the estates of those deceased.

Poltrock said Reece and company had held a referendum in 2001 on how the money would be distributed and that the members had voted that the money would go to everyone, not just the people who had worked the summer and after-school programs. She said that it was “not worth the money it would cost to hold another referendum with probably the same result.”

[Many members, not just those who worked the extracurricular programs, wondered why a referendum was held to begin with, when the whole issue was to make all work pensionable. It would seem that those who did the work were those who should have reaped the benefits of this settlement. Instead, the referendum held by Reece just before the election of 2001, and its continuing outcome here, allowed an appeal to basic human greed, so that the voters who didn’t earn this money (the majority) were given the opportunity to vote: “Yes, since you offer, I’ll take some of that.” As dozens of members have pointed out, the issue is hotly discussed in the schools, although it is difficult given the complex history to sort out the facts].

Despite the transparent fallacies of the Stewart administration’s pensionability “victory,” Stewart’s caucus, the UPC, again distributed literature at the entrance to the meeting blasting former President Deborah Lynch for not getting these moneys during her administration. Lynch has stated that the Board would have given Lynch this same settlement of $18 million two years ago, and she could have distributed it before the election of 2004 and claimed it be a great victory, but that she felt that the members deserved the full $39 million the settlement was now worth.

Lynch says that her grievance claimed that the Board actually owed the members $39 million because of new after-school programs they had initiated. Lynch states that the UPC leadership did not take Lynch’s grievance to arbitration, but instead, sold out the members by taking $18 million instead of going to arbitration for the $39 million. She said that this time the “bonus” the members would get was not even pensionable.

CFL Chief Speaks to Delegates:

“Can’t I be a human being?”

At the end of her report, President Stewart introduced the speaker for this meeting’s “speaker forum” — as she had announced at the previous meeting that there would be a series of speakers to address union issues and give historical perspective.

Many delegates feel that the speakers (mostly unannounced and not on the agenda) Stewart has had at every meeting since the beginning of her tenure as president are there to run out the clock on the meetings. Delegates are also saying that this new forum for unionists to speak at delegates meetings is meant to give Stewart labor credibility.

The speaker this month was Dennis Gannon, President of the CFL (Chicago Federation of Labor).

Gannon spoke about Ren10, union-busting, and privatization. He said we were the biggest organization with 38,000 teachers. He said there were 26 months to the end of the contract and people were watching what we did because that could be the direction of the leadership of the labor movement in the State of Illinois. He said, “The rest of the world is watching you…The City of Chicago has always been affected by what your leaders do — what Marilyn does.”

Gannon opened his speech with the words “Make no mistake. I fully support your president [pause] President Marilyn Stewart.” He repeated this so often throughout his speech that delegates were forced to wonder why that would even be in question. Gannon even took Stewart aback when he presented her with a kiss at the end of his speech which was so highly charged with repeated avowals of loyalty to her.

Bill Malugen, delegate from Roosevelt High School, explained to me a scene others might have been able to see, but which Malugen and Devon Morales, delegate from South Shore High School, could overhear as they were sitting in the second row directly behind the first row where Gannon and a colleague were seated.

Apparently, when Dennis Gannon entered the hall, he saw former President Debbie Lynch, whom he had known well for years, and he gave her a hug. Later, as he sat at the front of the hall, according to Malugen, Gannon was confronted first by Gail Koffman, grievance coordinator, and then by Pam Massarsky, lobbyist, about his giving Lynch a hug.

Both Koffman and Massarsky got in his face and excoriated Gannon for having hugged Debbie Lynch, telling him what a big mistake he had made, and saying didn’t he know that Lynch was their enemy, according to Malugen.

Malugen said that Gannon asked, “Can’t I be a human being?” and that there was conversation after the scene between him and his colleague about leaving at that point. They stayed, and Gannon gave a speech called by some “Jumping on the couch,” a phrase coined after a strange performance given by Tom Cruise when he was on the Oprah show.

It’s unfortunate that the bizarre antics of two [retired] UPC heavies evoked such a reaction from a great unionist such as Dennis Gannon.

There are delegates who maintain that the problem with the UPC is that they just fight too hard against anything they perceive as coming from “the other side.” These optimistic delegates feel that if the UPC could just allow other points of view, and when it didn’t hurt them, if they could concede a point when the other side is right, rather than blindly try to hold on to power, all might get right with the Union. Well, let’s hope that these delegates figure out how to temper the UPC leadership so that they decide to grow in wisdom through argument and dissension. With the UPC now entering the second half of its three-year term of office, it also remains to be seen whether these delegates will take the floor of union meetings and raise these issues with Stewart and her fellow officers.

Correction from last month’s article

Bill Malugen told me that I erred in the December issue when I said that the CEEC (Chicago Educational Employees Caucus) project ended when the IEA and NEA (Illinois/National Education Association) told the IFT and AFT they were hands off the Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) and would not help CEEC organize to disaffiliate from the CTU and the present parent organizations.

Malugen tells me that the CEEC petition drive to collect 10,000 signatures of CTU members is continuing with petitions coming in from schools, and that when the requisite number of signatures has been collected, there will be an election held by the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board between the present leadership and CEEC as to who will be the bargaining agent for Chicago’s teachers and paraprofessionals.

Items for Action

On the official agenda for the meeting, there were two “Items for Action”: A. Approve the 2005-2006 Legislative Program, and B. Approve the “Rules for Nomination and Election of House of Delegate Members.”

Item A., the legislative program, with its desirable and sometimes lofty goals, passed handily. I say “lofty” because often teachers would show me a list of the legislative demands and say the union is really achieving a great deal. They didn’t realize that in some ways, the list at times was only a wish list with negligible prospects of fulfillment.

There were some questions raised regarding Item B. which dealt with the rules for the nomination and election of House delegates, upcoming in January, 2006. Bill Dolnick, city-wide delegate and social worker, questioned the fact that psychologists and social workers, while not working as teachers, were supposed to represent teachers and were not designated in these rules as a functional group representing only psychologists and social workers.

I rose to question what was not spelled out in the rules for city-wide delegates that pertained to retiree delegates. This House meeting was the day before the Retiree Holiday Luncheon of December 8. The city-wide rules presented in the delegates’ packet did not spell out the rules for the nominations of retiree delegates which were to occur immediately after the luncheon of the next day. I had been told that the Rules-Election Committee had changed the rules to say that there could only be one nomination per person and that the nominator must have the nominee’s acceptance letter in hand if the nominee weren’t present at the nominations meeting following the luncheon.

At the mike, I said that it was unfair to change the rules on the eve of the nominations, that these changes were not even spelled out in the handout. People had not been informed of these rules, I said, and that, for example when, you signed petitions allowing politicians to run for office, you could sign as many petitions as you wanted, in effect nominating all of those for whom you had signed a petition. I said it had never been heard of that you could not nominate more than one candidate, that even in schools, you could nominate more than one candidate for delegate.

Samantha Brick Schulz, Chair of the Rules-Election Committee, rose to say that you could nominate more than one candidate, that there had been no rule made against nominating more than one. When I had brought up the same question at the retirees’ monthly meeting on November 30th, I was first told by Jackie Mooney that there were no changes. Then John Keating (retiree delegate and member of the Rules-Election Committee) went to the podium and told Mooney that there had been a change: only one nomination per person. Mooney then announced this change.

When the Retirees’ Holiday Luncheon nominating meeting was held December 8th, retirees were able to nominate more than one candidate. Ironically, after the nominations ended, I was confronted by an attendee named Judith Givens who asked me, while I was at the officials’ podium filling out my candidacy acceptance form, if I had nominated more than one candidate. When I said I had, as had many others including Gail Koffman (field representatives and coordinators were being nominated for this hot-button retiree election), Givens said that she had been at the Rules-Election Committee meeting and that the committee had ruled only one nomination per person. She then started remonstrating with the officers about that.

I stood at my seat when the mikes were removed at this House of Delegates meeting to say that it was unfair that the rules were being changed the eve before the retirees nominating meeting when the general rules without these specifics were being passed by the House. I said this in regard to the new rule about the nominator having to have the nominee’s signed acceptance at the time of the nomination if the nominee were not present.

Later, during the official question-and-motion period, I lined up at the mike to make a motion that this rule at least in all fairness not be applied to the nominations of the next day’s luncheon. Samantha Brick Schulz, Chair of the Rules-Election Committee, came to me and persuaded me to sit down by telling me that they had decided to change this rule and that nominees not present would be able to send in their acceptances in due time. I had her sign on the dotted line on a paper where I had written out my motion, and then wondered if I had been mistaken. However, before the meeting ended, Samantha got to the front of the hall to announce this change, saying the acceptance of candidacy notes would have to be submitted by nominated retirees not present by the next day after the nominations. (Since there has been no verified list of candidates that anyone can get to date — January 1, 2006 — “the next day” of December 9th seems to me now, as it did even then, rather unnecessarily precipitous.)

Item B. on the rules for the January, 2006, was passed by a voice vote.

Pre-meeting question period

A number of items of interest were raised during the pre-meeting question period.

Ernestine Murphy, delegate from Blair Special Education Facility and former Pension Fund officer and trustee, asked who was responsible for printing untrue information or mistakes in the Union newspaper. Treasurer Linda Porter who moderated this portion of the meeting said that any questions about the newspaper should be referred to Editor John Ostenburg.

Diane Blaszczyk, delegate from Onahan School, said that principals were getting teachers for cell phones and such things without even passing out the Employee Discipline Code. Gail Koffman, grievance coordinator, got up to the microphone to answer that question and said that the new discipline code would not by given out every year, that they were sometimes giving it out to new teachers, but often were telling new teachers where they could download the code.

As a retiree delegate, I asked what security measures would be put into place by the CTU for the counting of ballots for the retiree delegates election. Would there be double envelopes to ensure confidentiality for the voter, and would an outside agency be hired to count the ballots? I asked. Financial Secretary Mark Ochoa, liaison to the retirees, answered the question. He said that the Rules-Election Committee would count the ballots and that they were honest people.

I asked Why not an outside agency? I said that the Rules-Election Committee had been purged of “dissidents” to the UPC party line. (Sandra Finkel, delegate from Franklin Magnet School, and Lou Pyster, former Director of Research under Lynch who had served on the committee for 32 years under six presidents both received letters recently saying their services were no longer needed.) I said we didn’t want court cases, and we didn’t want the fiasco that happened at the 2003 retiree delegate elections when 174 forged ballots were found (with votes for UPC candidates, according to Sarah Loftus, former director under Lynch). That election had to be done over again, properly, with double envelopes and an outside agency. The several UPC “coaches” for the officers then began yelling from the floor that my question had been answered, and when I was told that from the stage, I said, “My question had been answered inadequately,” and sat down.

Another delegate asked if it was too late to submit a contract proposal, and was told that it was. This early gathering and cut-off for contract proposal has created foreboding in the minds of many delegates that an early contract would be rushed through as the one Reece had rammed through before the mayoral election of 1999.

(The coordinator of the contract proposals announced later in the meeting during the officers’ reports that there were over 400 contract proposals. She said that 22 sub-committees had been formed, and that the chair of each of those committees got the appropriate proposals and narrowed the number down to 3.)

Another delegate whose name I also couldn’t hear said that the union cards had expired October 31st, and that no one had received current ones. Ochoa said they were working to straighten out that problem. He answered a similar question about overdue membership lists for the delegates’ use by explaining that the Board wasn’t giving the Union the lists directly, and that it was a problem that was being ironed out.

A delegate thanked Vice-President Ted Dallas for coming to the school and said that the administration at the school was intimidated by the parents and the kids, that they were afraid to discipline the students, and that offending students were even being placed temporarily in the classrooms of other teachers. This comment reinforced the belief of many delegates that this Union administration is not enforcing the Safety and Security contract provisions. The response to this question mentioned that the Union leadership was working on this provision.

Kelli Pfeiffer, delegate from Boone Elementary School, said that regarding the coming January 27th Professional Development Day, schools were having difficulty getting their principals to acknowledge that the activities for half that day were to be self-directed for the teachers. Treasurer Porter said that CEO Arne Duncan would have to be “knocked in the head” so that he would finally understand this, and that President Stewart would be meeting with him regarding this matter.

Vince Macina of Steinmetz High School rose to the mike to talk about the “political garbage passed outside” by CEEC. He said it had slanderous statements about the Union leadership, and asked if it was legal. This statement, I felt, was quite a contrast from the times when his candidacy and critical comments opposed the UPC leadership. Porter answered his question by saying it was legal, but not right.

President Stewart rose to speak at this juncture. She called for unity. She said it was one thing to dispute a caucus, but quite another to destroy the Union. She said the CEEC petitions were murder/suicide and told the members not to sign them. She said this movement would destroy the CTU as we know it. She said we were already under attack and getting our butts kicked. “I need you to have my back,” Stewart told the delegates. A delegate who spoke later told Stewart, “And I have your back.”

Later, during the officers’ reports, Vice-President Ted Dallas said that if this new group got their way to disaffiliate from the CTU, then there would not be a contract with the CPS (Chicago Public Schools) and the new group would have to start all over again in the same way the first contract had been hammered out in 1967.

Forty per cent of the teachers had less than ten years of experience, a delegate said when the question period resumed. She asked if there could be a booklet to educate the younger teachers who didn’t know what we had had to do to win things. She was told that there were articles in the Union newspaper which gave that historical perspective.

Bernie Eshoo, delegate from Lincoln Park High School, said that the regular student-to-special education student classroom ratio of 70/30 percent was being violated at schools. She said at a PPC meeting at a school, the principal said that the ratio was now 60/40 percent. Gail Koffman, grievance coordination, was asked to respond, and said that there had been a meeting about it, and that the ratio was still 70/30 percent.

To another question, the response was that teachers can call their field representatives to invite Union officials to visit a school if the delegate was not doing the work.

It was also established in this session, that all delegates — even if elected only months ago — must run for re-election in January of 2006.

The last question of the pre-meeting question period dealt with teachers being asked to, in effect, sign away their rights to get help exiting the school building if it was burning, since the request was based on their health of the moment. Koffman again was called to respond and said that the teacher could say: “For the time I have this cast, I want help to exit the building.” She said, “And that will cover you.” I felt her answer showed she didn’t fully appreciate all possible future contingencies. Possibly what needed to be investigated was whether a teacher would be able to effectively change this information as the need arose in the event of change/s in health status.

The official question and motion period

Karen Kreinik, delegate from Columbus School, spoke of the low level and quality of the Board’s offerings for professional development. She gave an example of one called “Talking to Children.” The presenter didn’t think teachers were talking to the children.

When Devon Morales, delegate from South Shore High School, tried to speak, UPC devotee who often makes motions for adjournment of the meeting, Diane Blaszczyk, ran to the mike and moved to adjourn the meeting. I rose to the mike with a point of information: the constitution and by-laws did not allow a motion to adjourn while a speaker was speaking. Blaszczek was told she was out of order.

Morales had had a wonderfully boisterous and funny presentation outside of the union hall before the meeting. He was wishing everyone Happy Holidays, passing out a leaflet, and asking where were the Christmas bonuses for the delegates, since the officers and staff of the Union were getting their one-week-salary Christmas bonuses again, just as they had given themselves one last year (a practice Lynch had stopped).

At the mike now, Morales merely asked what was the procedure for a raise in the delegate stipend. He was told that when the delegates pass a new budget, the stipend is dealt with there. I think they had feared he would give the presentation he gave outside, and were almost giggling with relief as they answered him. This too was a great first: No Holiday thank-you reception for the delegates this year.

Lois Jones, delegate from Schurz High School, waved a leaflet from the delegates packet and asked President Stewart how she could ask for unity when Stewart demeaned fellow unionists (like Lynch and CEEC) the way this literature of Stewart’s administration did. (There was a leaflet about CEEC with laughingly over-the-top Halloween graphics and type face. Off the subject, the packet also contained a letter from Marilyn Stewart to Arne Duncan with strangely foreign-sounding phrasing, as well as two spaces after each period in violation of computer word-processing conventions — something also found in other items in the packet.)

One question/comment by a delegate I couldn’t identify asked if PACT (Lynch’s Pro-Active Chicago Teachers and School-Related Employees Caucus) was violating privacy by going to court asking for a school-by-school vote count on the Pension Fund election. (It should be remembered that only when the courts granted us the right to those figures in union officer elections, did the UPC lose an election.)

Lisa Levy, delegate from Curie High School, said that rising class size was in itself a reason to go on strike to get back that bargaining right. She said the Board was putting great numbers of special ed kids in classes, sometimes without identifying them as such. Levy said she hadn’t seen class size reform in thirty years.

Peter Ardito, health care coordinator, explained in answer to a question that a number of schools didn’t get their medical packets in time so that the deadline for choosing had been extended for a week.

When the fifteen-minute question period was up, Barbara Baker, retiree delegate, tried to extend it for another fifteen minutes, but her motion did not pass. In fact, someone whose name and face I could not catch moved to adjourn, and again the meeting was adjourned before committee reports could be heard or new business addressed. From the bottom of my heart, I wish you all the best in the coming year.