Anti-public ed crowd’s ideas hampering contract talks

As contract mediation continues, UFT officials are fighting fire with fire by vigorously taking on what they call the counterproductive and potentially disastrous ideas being floated by the anti-public education crowd. Some of these ideas floated recently in the press include firing all educators in the Absent Teacher Reserve and allowing principals to decide who gets laid off.

The constant drumbeat of attacks on educators has not made the talks for a new contract between the UFT and Department of Education any easier, union officials said, and the two sides remain far apart after more than two months of mediation. The next session is scheduled for May 24.

When the UFT said talks were at an impasse on Jan. 15 and asked the state labor board to appoint a mediator to intervene in the talks, President Michael Mulgrew held out some hope that “a neutral third party” might be able to help the two sides resolve their differences. If mediation fails, the labor board will appoint a fact-finding panel to hold hearings and make nonbinding recommendations designed to help the parties reach a final settlement.

In recent years — 2004, 2001 and 1993 — the contract between the UFT and the Department of Education was reached with the assistance of a fact-finding panel.

Under the state’s Taylor Law, which governs relations between management and public employee unions, all the terms of the expired agreement continue in place until a new agreement is reached.