Eighty UFT members will receive the $3,000 ratification bonus negotiated in the 2023 DOE-UFT contract after an independent arbitrator ruled in the union’s favor on Sept. 17. The decision resolves a union-initiated grievance challenging the city Department of Education’s refusal to pay the bonus to UFT-represented employees on terminal leave as of June 27, 2023.

Tom Andros said he was frustrated when he learned the DOE had denied him the payment. “We all did our jobs,” said Andros, who retired that June after 25 years of teaching physical education. “I felt as though our years of service weren’t appreciated.”

Arbitrator Howard C. Edelman found that the DOE violated the 2023 Memorandum of Agreement and ordered it to pay the $3,000 to those members — a total payout of $240,000.

“We are proud of this arbitration victory and will continue to hold the DOE accountable and protect every UFT member’s rights under the contract,” said UFT Grievance Director Mark Collins.

The 2023 contract stipulates that all UFT-represented employees on payroll as of June 27, 2023, are eligible for the bonus. Employees on terminal leave remain on payroll as they use their accumulated CAR days — with every two days in their sick bank counting as one day — before officially retiring.

At arbitration, the union argued that the DOE had paid ratification bonuses to UFT members on terminal leave under the 2007 and 2014 contracts and that the union had never agreed to exclude them from the 2023 bonus.

The DOE countered that its position was consistent with “pattern bargaining,” noting that employees on terminal leave from other municipal unions did not receive the bonus.

In his decision, Edelman wrote that since UFT-represented personnel on retirement leave received the bonus in 2007 and 2014, they were entitled to it again in 2023.

Karlene Turner, a former chapter leader at IS 144 in the Bronx and one of the 80 affected members, said she was angered by the DOE’s “unfair” action but “extremely happy” when she learned that the union had prevailed.

“I know the UFT and know that the union works hard at whatever it does and comes through for its members.”

Andros, who retired from the Brooklyn Studio Secondary School in 2023, said he was “disgusted” with the DOE for withholding the bonus.

“If I owed the DOE 10 cents, it would be taken out of my next check,” he said. “I’m grateful and thankful to the UFT for fighting so hard for us.”