By Theresa D. Daniels

The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU) House of Delegates meeting convened on April 5th, 2006 at Plumbers Hall, 1340 West Washington Blvd.

Mail ballot initiative for fraud-free elections defeated

Only after the meeting had been adjourned was the hot item of the day addressed. After delegates called out for a report on the mail ballot referendum of the previous day, Vice President Ted Dallas announced the vote tallies.

And 2,039 (11 percent) votes went to Proposition 3, which was placed last on the ballot, though it was the proposal that initiated this referendum and was on the Pro-Active Chicago Teachers and School Employees (PACT) petition that started the mail ballot movement to have ballots mailed to members’ addresses of record and tabulated by an independent and certified agency.

The American Federation of Teachers (AFT) had recommended that the CTU go to the mail ballot (as do the teachers unions in larger cities) after the disputed election of 2004, where 900 ballots went missing in an election with a 500 vote margin. In this election, the AFT then appointed the Marilyn Stewart team as officers of the CTU.

The Stewart team campaigns against the mail ballot

For almost a year since the petition for a mail ballot referendum was submitted by PACT at the May, 2005 House of Delegates meeting, the Stewart team and her United Progressive Caucus (UPC) have campaigned against it both in the Union newspaper and in expensive mailings to the membership.

At first the argument against the mail ballot was that the union chiefs had to protect “residency privacy”— as if so many teachers were hiding their true addresses while required to live in the city, and as if the Board of Education wasn’t mailing to their employees’ addresses of record.

In later mailings to the members, the CTU argued that the mail ballot would cost the Union $100,000. In another piece of literature, while wearing their UPC hats, they argued that it would cost the Union $150,000.

While that sounds like a lot of money, in fact, what many members don’t realize is how much this “Corvette of Unions” spends on itself. $150,000 for this Union means hiring one less crony whose salary and perks cost more than that amount, in a Union administration which has hired plenty of cronies. The Marilyn Stewart administration has raised the culture of greed to an art form.

Mail ballot referendum held with no input from the House

After stonewalling on the PACT petition from May, 2005 to November, 2005 — when the Union leadership finally announced they had “verified” the 2,500 signatures on the petition (such a lengthy process never before heard of) — the Union chiefs, rather than put the mail ballot to a referendum by the membership for an up or down vote in a timely way, kept insisting that there was legal language that had to be worked out.

While they were working out their own alternatives to the PACT mail ballot initiative, Marilyn Stewart and company managed to keep any discussion of the mail ballot from ever coming to the floor of the House. This was achieved by parliamentary maneuvering, with Stewart calling delegates out of order or turning off the microphone if she didn’t like the question or comment. With UPC affiliated delegates and even CTU staffers mobbing the microphones, as well as canceling the official Question, Comment, and Motion Period by calling for the adjournment of meetings. This has been reported with great detail in my previous articles in Substance. [They can be found on the Substance website: www.substancenews.com].

The final coup of this Union leadership was to suddenly schedule the long-awaited referendum for the day before the April House meeting which was in a time period when the House would not have met for two months. No chance for the discussion and debate in the House of Delegates — the supreme authority, as the Union Constitution and By-laws defines the House.

All delegates were newly seated in the House at the February, 2006 meeting, after January elections. Because of paperwork delays, some were only seated at this April meeting, the March meeting having been canceled due to the Delegates Workshop (which could have easily fitted in a House of Delegates meeting, but didn’t).

This brand new House, with a large number of first-time delegates (reflecting the exodus of experienced teachers retiring in great numbers) had largely never heard even the aborted attempts made by some delegates to bring up the mail ballot referendum.

When asked for comment, former President Deborah Lynch said, “It was definitely a set up.”

There was no chance to explain the importance of a fraud-free election process for this Union. No chance to remind people of the kind of alleged fraud that had gone on in past elections because of the opportunities for fraud that existed.

No chance to explain why the UPC dynasty (President Stewart’s caucus) could not be defeated until certain safeguards in the process had been put in place by PACT (Former President Lynch’s caucus).

In one referendum, teachers voted to have school-by-school vote tallies published after elections, something the UPC fought saying that the Board could retaliate against schools for voting a certain way. A second ruling came from the Labor Department and said the number of ballots printed must be known. We all know what can be done with blank ballots both at the schools (think 600 polling places where there is no security for the ballots) and in transport to the tabulating agency.

Only after these changes in the Union election process was it possible for Deborah Lynch and PACT to defeat the UPC in 2001, and that was not a close election like the one in 2004 where Lynch “lost.” Fraud is much easier to perpetrate and much harder to detect in a close election.

Teachers, already overburdened and exhausted by the teacher torture in practice in Chicago, said they voted their convenience in this referendum on the mail ballot. They said that it was easier to just vote at the school, as long as you were there anyway, instead of having one more thing to tackle at home. They trusted their delegates. Many hadn’t heard that the AFT had recommended that the Union go to the mail ballot so that only the voter’s hand and the tabulating agency could touch the ballot.

Delegates fix contract proposals

Back to the union meeting. After the naming of those who had passed before us, a very short speech by AFT Secretary Treasurer Nat LaCour, and a litany of over twenty names of sergeants-at-arms for whom applause was solicited, the Officers’ Reports were canceled so that the delegates could work on fixing the ten pages of contract proposals.

President Stewart included a written report in the delegates packet with one item of note warning teachers in the light of the Kennedy High School violence that they should not be dissuaded by administrators from filing the proper form, an Assault Form, not an Incident Report.

The House voted to consider the contract proposals submitted in the Professional Problems Committee Report “one page at a time with a carry-over for the continued provision, with the proviso that after each page is accepted, the page will not be considered again.” A vote at a previous meeting had allotted a 15-minute discussion per page.

Erin Doubleday, Chair of the Professional Problems Committee, did a brisk job chairing the discussion of the contract proposal pages.

Though the published version of the proposals had undergone seven revisions from January to April on the website alone, and many other revisions in other venues, according to Lou Pyster, former Union Director of Research under Lynch and currently elected retiree delegate, there were still many problem areas.

Proposal language guts ESP seniority

Maureen Callaghan, former Union Treasurer and Officer Liaison to Educational Support Personnel (ESP) under Lynch, having been a clerk for the schools herself, said that in the current contract proposal language, the entire seniority clause (Article 9-6.18, page 3, Layoff and Reappointment of ESP) is lined out. This is the seniority clause which in the Lynch contract gave the ESP’s seniority from the date of hire.

In January, 2006, the CTU had some sheets with inconsistent plans for ESP’s. Now in April they wiped everything out and said it should be done on seniority, although ESP’s already had system-wide seniority with the Lynch contract.

This clause written in 1998 by former Recording Secretary, now lobbyist, Pam Massarsky, according to Pyster, could not then be put into the contract because of 4.5, the bargaining rights restrictions, but the Board had agreed to make it policy and then reneged. The PACT administration made the Board make it policy and then put it in the contract.

An ESP delegate attempted to correct this deletion after the page had already been passed, and protested when she was told the rules did not allow her to go back to address this. However, it is hoped by many that there will be some correction made to this egregious error in the general demands section of the contract proposals to be considered at the next House meeting.

Pyster said, “This is just one more example of how the present Union leadership does not understand the present contract and yet refuses to work with Lynch (now elected to the Executive Board) to gain an understanding of it. Either they do not understand it, or they’re determined not to enforce it since they are so invested in bad-mouthing the achievements of the Lynch administration.”

He said that not only seniority was to be displaced in this new contract proposal language, but also the recall procedure by seniority from date of hire by which hundreds of ESP’s have been placed in positions. The present leadership, Pyster said, has not enforced placing personnel in positions by monitoring the vacancies of sixty days.

He offered as a contrasting example how when the Stewart team does enforce the gains in the Lynch contract they so vilify, they seem to do quite well, as indicated by Class-size Committee Chair Sharon Orlowek’s reports on the monitoring panels for class-size problems.

In the contract proposals, however, he said, the leadership seemed to follow the dictum, “When in doubt, line it out.” The monitoring panels have been left out in these contract proposals for Article 28—Class Size, and should have been added and then deleted. Also, principals can let go at the end of the school year additional personnel hired due to class-size issues.

Pyster said that another example of deletions-gone-wild was in the health care provision where the leadership deleted a line, and then added the committee that had been deleted.

Discipline contract proposal fiasco corrected

In Article 30. Discipline, the following key element for teachers was lined out: “Said written statement shall include a summary of any informational background or prior action taken by the teacher relative to the student’s behavioral problems. The principal or the principal’s designee will only reinstate the pupil after a conference on classroom conduct and school rules which will be held on non-instructional time and must include the teacher.”

Saying that this deletion gutted the effectiveness of the discipline article, Bill Malugen, delegate from Roosevelt High School and a leader of Chicago Educational Employees Caucus (CEEC), restored this deletion to the article by a House vote, leaving it as it stands in the present Lynch contract.

Other problems addressed and yet to be addressed

In Article 44, the CTU is trying to get rid of the 15 minutes added to the work day, but doesn’t ask for keeping the school year reduced by seven days as is in the present contract. The seven-day reduction of the school year was the trade-off for the 15 minutes added to the work day. Further, the new proposal language adds snow days into the mix.

Lois Jones, delegate from Schurz High School, and others tried to correct this, but the motion failed.

“This is just political posturing for the people who don’t like the 15 minutes (seven of which are teacher self-directed time),” said Sarah Loftus, former director under Lynch.

In a press conference regarding violence at Kennedy High School, President Stewart said the answer was more counselors. She said that the ratio now was 400 students to one counselor. However, the desired ratio she cited was closer to the one presently in existence.

Allegra Podrovsky, delegate from Kelvyn Park, was highly instrumental in several successful corrections made at the meeting.

Art, music, and computer teachers were added to the article giving teachers additional duty-free prep time after a rather comical exchange finally led to a determination that a principal could assign one duty per week, but only if the teacher didn’t have division, Podrovsky was able to add.

The House also voted to delete the high school articles that would promote seven 50-minute classes, thereby losing teaching positions, while the principals would still get funding for eight periods. Also deleted was the advisory, advisory prep period, staff development period, and teacher collaboration period—all one per week. These periods were deleted for the 42-, 45-, and the 50-minute schedules.

A new article added a budget line item of $2,000 for physical education supplies.

Noreen Gutekanst, delegate from Inter-American School, succeeded in adding language that would give schools kindergarten all day and would allow for one teacher instead of half a teacher at a school.

Former President Lynch succeeded in adding the following to Article 36-16: At the end of each year of this agreement the Board will provide 5+5 for up to 2,000 teachers and ESP’s. She argued that this had always been in the top three demands of teachers and that it was nowhere in these proposals. Allegra Podrovsky added that the ESP’s got 5+5 in the first year of the Lynch contract.

Kenneth Ladien, city-wide delegate for cadres and substitute teachers, moved to delete Article 32-8 on domestic partners and replace it with benefits for substitute teachers who, he argued, kept our system running, and were one-tenth of our employees. A number of voices called out a knee-jerk second, but Chair Erin Doubleday kept saying that he did not have a second.

I finally said loudly that I seconded him. I was asked to stand, as if to reveal myself as the enemy of domestic partners. I explained that I believed that everyone deserved a second so they could speak to their motion. (It only takes a minute to vote down a motion, and I don’t like the trickery of keeping someone from speaking based on a technicality. I sign campaign petitions that way too, feeling that anyone should be able to run.)

After Ladien’s motion was quickly voted down, I took the mike on that issue. I asked for greater minds than mine to help me find a way to give substitute teachers some medical coverage. The page where that would have been possible had already been passed, and Ladien had not made it to the mike in time for his motion to be made there. Greater minds declined to help me find a way.

Perhaps just as the ESP’s had missed the right moment in these speed-ball contract proposal corrections and might still make their case in general demands at the next meeting, so might a motion on behalf of substitute teachers prevail.

Many other corrections were made to approximately seven proposals pages at this meeting, too many to describe here. The three remaining pages will be dealt with at the meeting May 3rd.

Kenneth Ladien called for a quorum vote a short while later. At least 250 delegates were needed at this 6:30 p.m. juncture of the meeting, and the count showed only 226 delegates present. Veronica Rieck, delegate from Lafayette School, moved to adjourn the meeting, though we could still have had the official question, comment, and motion period, albeit without the motions (unless the maker agreed to have the motion deferred to committee) since without a quorum the House cannot vote on anything.

“Outsider” parliamentarian upholds long-standing delegate complaints

I’ve deplored in previous articles that though the CTU acquired Parliamentarian Barbara Hillman, former IFT counsel, in November, 2005 as a replacement for Attorney Jennifer Poltrock, the parliamentarian could not step in and correct parliamentary procedure at meetings unless asked a specific question by the president. I deplored that she was not being utilized and her counsel was not being sought, while democracy fell by the wayside at the Union meetings, with the Union leadership ignoring all the rules.

I was outraged when in her President’s Report in the January, 2006 issue of the Union newspaper, President Stewart said it was unfortunate that the Union had to hire an “outsider” as parliamentarian.

However, at this meeting, where Stewart’s people (Gail Koffman, Sharon Orlowek, Diana Sheffer, Diane Blaszczyk, and Veronica Rieck) were speedily moving to close debate on proposal corrections, the parliamentarian was asked by President Stewart to answer a delegate’s protest that Sheffer was a Union employee. “What is she doing moving to close debate?” he asked, and demanded a decision from the parliamentarian.

Parliamentarian Hillman stated that only delegates can move to close debate, something many delegates have been saying during the sixteen or so House meetings under the Stewart administration when we asked why Massarsky, Sheffer, and Koffman were taking the floor as if they were delegates. Our outcries were ignored and ruled out of order by an administration that observes no order and has refused to follow Roberts Rules of Order, the Constitution, and the By-laws.

[Koffman has had herself elected one of the retiree delegates since the January,2006 elections. At the nominating meeting for retiree delegates at the holiday luncheon, she made a successful motion to close nominations, even though the rules stated that nominations would be made until there were no more, and there were many worthy candidates still waiting to be nominated. We needed Parliamentarian Hillman there too. Who thought we needed to bring the rule book to a luncheon?]

Contract confusion

During the pre-meeting unofficial question period Lou Pyster brought up the topic that the Board and the CTU have now amended the contract five times under the Stewart administration without the ratification by the House of Delegates or the members. The Union Constitution states that amendments must be taken to the members in referendums held at schools to be voted either up or down after discussion and debate in the House, he said.

An exception would be a new employee category which would then not have this restriction, he added.

Otherwise, he continued, no matter if the amendment is good or bad, the leadership cannot be the only one to decide. They cannot put an amendment in the contract that only a handful of people have seen. Not only the particular interest group should be informed, but everyone should know. A letter to the membership stating a done deed is not a referendum and doesn’t count, he said.

Vice President Ted Dallas told Pyster that everyone had received copies of the amendments in the mailings and ended the discussion by telling Pyster he was out of order.

Some delegates speculate that the leadership wouldn’t want the amendment for lead teachers run past the House because in it the principal can reduce the hours the teacher works. In the contract proposal, this amendment to the contract, not ratified by the Union membership, is now being further amended—an amendment to an amendment which the leadership had no right on its own to add to the contract.

Regarding an amendment to do with Probationary Appointed Teachers (PAT), President Stewart said that the amendment won seniority for PAT’s in closing schools.

“That’s already in the contract,” Deborah Lynch said to me when I discussed this with her.

Pension Fund “Holiday”?

Lou Pyster also brought up the topic of the Board-threatened pension “holiday” or raid. When Vice President Dallas said that the Board had provided the pension fund with $75 million to take care of their obligation when the fund falls below 90%, Pyster said that the Board was offering $16 million on paper, both for this year and next.

Vice President Dallas told Pyster, “Louie, stop that. We know you’re the expert.”

Pyster said that if the Board doesn’t succeed in having the law changed as it is attempting to do, then the Board would have to pay $69 million each year.

[Dallas should have known about the $16 million the Board was offering to pay, as our pension fund trustees are also Union employees: Treasurer Linda Porter, Field Rep Maria Rodriguez, and Quest Center Coordinator Connee Fitch-Blank. The two pension fund lobbyists, Eugene Bonds and Henry Anselmo, reported at a pension fund meeting April 18th that the CTU had spoken to Senators Madigan and Jones to stop the Board’s attempt to be excused or waivered from their obligation, but that the Board was still trying for a pension holiday or raid.]

Reportedly, as long as the legislators are in session, we won’t know, according to Pyster. Below 80% (lowering the standard) doesn’t seem to be live.

Delegates worry about a last minute deal in Springfield. Will the Pension Board go along with it? they ask. Will the Union cave in and accept it in trade for some other benefit that the Union wants? Given that the Union wants a pay raise, lower health care premiums, schools to get out seven days early, and the elimination of the extra 15 minutes teachers work each day, will the pension be the thing that gives? Pensioners don’t vote on the contract, and the many young teachers newly in the system now don’t yet believe that pensions have anything to do with them.

The pension fund delayed sending out the campaign literature the trustees said would go out after the February 16th meeting, and only sent out a “Don’t worry” message in the March quarterly newsletter, according to Pyster.

Pensioners, who might be among those most worried about any raid on the pension fund, and their elected retiree delegates, of which I am one, were not afforded the monthly retiree meeting for the month of April. When I asked Retiree Functional Vice President Jackie Mooney why there was no meeting, she said that it was up to Financial Secretary Mark Ochoa. Ochoa has not returned my call.

This, after Marilyn Stewart administration’s series of discriminatory acts against their own elected retiree delegates, who again were not allowed to attend the March Delegates Workshop, and not encouraged to lead the charge on Springfield Lobby Day when this year only a few Union officers and staffers went to speak to the legislators and teachers could not go due to an unusual ISAT schedule.

Have Marilyn and company ever been taught to respect their elders and value their wisdon? I like to say that if you’re lucky enough to live that long, you too will become a retiree.