About 900 educators, along with 100 public school parents, made the three-hour trek by bus to Albany for UFT Lobby Day on March 11 to urge lawmakers to fix Tier 6 of the pension system, overhaul mayoral control of city schools and increase state foundation aid. That same week, thousands more UFT members sent emails urging their state representatives to support the union's lobbying priorities as part of the UFT's first-ever Virtual Lobby Day.

Upon their arrival, the educators and parents gathered in the Empire State Plaza Convention Center, where UFT President Michael Mulgrew, Gov. Kathy Hochul, State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli and legislative leaders addressed them.

Mulgrew explained that it was a perfect time to lobby because negotiations on the state budget for the 2024-25 fiscal year, which starts April 1, were heating up.

Mulgrew said all the state aid for New York City public schools in this year's final state budget must reach classrooms and help fund lower class sizes.

"We don't want the mayor taking it and putting it in his reserves," he said. "We don't want the Department of Education hiring more consultants."

At the March 20 Delegate Assembly, Mulgrew said members at Lobby Day did a great job of framing the class size issue.

"Their position was always, ‘We already passed the law so we are good.' Now they all understand and believe that the mayor and his folks are scheming to try to get around the law," he said.

In the afternoon, UFT members split up into smaller delegations to meet with the Assembly members and senators who represent their schools.

Members told lawmakers how Tier 6 of the pension system is hurting teacher retention in New York City.

Jonathan Fickies

Chapter Leader Linford Leith, of the Bronx Academy of Health Careers, looks over the priorities at the start of UFT Lobby Day in Albany.

Michael Tajalle, a history teacher and chapter leader at the Brooklyn School for Social Justice, said it is unfair that a Tier 6 member who starts teaching right after college must work 40 years before they can retire with an unreduced pension.

"I've lost a lot of good colleagues," he said.

Sylvia Ginsberg, an academic intervention services teacher at PS 349 in Queens, had a similar Fix Tier 6 message for Assembly Member Alicia Hyndman: Too many teachers in Tier 6 are leaving the profession early. "They just don't see the benefit of staying in the profession that long," Ginsberg said.

Revamping mayoral control of schools was also top of mind for many educators given how Mayor Eric Adams has used his unilateral power to cut city funding for public schools, co-locate charter schools in public school buildings and throw sand in the gears of the implementation of the class size law.

"Adams is going to do his best to try and break the class size law, so we need to push back to make sure that doesn't happen," said Lee Resnick, a social studies teacher at IS 349 in Brooklyn.

Jessica Roach, a teacher at PS 112 in East Harlem, said her school had to reduce after-school and academic intervention programs after it lost more than $80,000 in mid-year budget cuts.

"When mayoral control is happening, the state funds are not getting to us. Kids shouldn't lose those things because of the choice of one person," she told a staffer for Assembly Member Edward Gibbs in her visit to Gibbs' legislative office.

Any hopes the mayor had of extending mayoral control as part of the state budget were dashed when the two houses of the state Legislature made no mention of the issue in their one-house budget proposals, released on the day after Lobby Day. State lawmakers must tackle the issue by June 30, when the current version of the mayoral control law expires.

Members and parents also called on lawmakers to address the demand for more affordable housing in New York City.

"We need to be able to live in the same neighborhood as our students," said Christopher Ahearn, the chapter leader at the Lower Manhattan Arts Academy.

The power of UFT Lobby Day extended beyond the corridors of the State Capitol this year.

Sara McInerney, the chapter leader at PS 164 in Brooklyn, said about 70 of her members brought their mobile devices with them for the school's Virtual Lobby Day on that same Monday and sent emails to their state lawmakers using the UFT's digital tool.

Not everyone was aware of the Tier 6 inequities, McInerney said, so she explained the issue with the help of a digital Lobby Day presentation that the UFT had sent to chapter leaders.

"It was the most participation I've had in my chapter on anything," she said. "I was really pleased."