UFT Town Hall Minutes 5/17/24
Minutes taken by an anonymous NAC member today. Thank you to that member. I’m too busy with the TRS election–which strangely wasn’t discussed tonight, despite many in opposition assuming that was the reason for the townhall’s timing today in the first place–to write my
What’s going on with the TRS Election? – UFT Executive Board Minutes – 5/6/2024
Summary/analysis: The meeting opened with Roberta giving an impassioned theatric performance about the flaws of commercialized healthcare and the need for the New York Health Act. There’s no way my minutes did her performance justice. Norm Scott (ednotes) followed Roberta about the problems with o
DO YOU HAVE A UFT RETIREE IN YOUR LIFE? PROTECT THEIR HEALTHCARE, YOUR HEALTHCARE, AND OUR DIGNITY!
In what is literally a life or death situation, all UFT Retirees need to vote for the slate RETIREE ADVOCATE in the upcoming Retired Teachers Chapter Election. In a shocking and unforgivable betrayal, Michael Mulgrew and Eric Adams conspire to place all municipal retirees into a trashbag,
On May 8, YOU decide who represents UFT Members on the pension board. I hope you choose Ben.
This May, everyday UFT members have the rare chance to make a choice for themselves. Most of the time, decision-making in our union is executed behind closed doors by a handful of leaders. Some of those leaders, at least, are elected, albeit barely, in elections that intentionally limit exposure of
UFT Leadership Squashes Motion to Improve Our Dental Care – DA Minutes 4-17-2024
Analysis: At last night’s DA, there was one moment of note, as far as I’m concerned. Peter Lamphere introduced a resolution in the new motions period. In that time, he successfully made the argument that our dental reimbursement rates are woefully inadequate when compared to those of other munic
UFT Executive Board Minutes 4/15/2024
Note: Thanks to Ed Calamia and Mike Shulman for taking notes, which were used to type up these minutes. Sill opens the meeting – Mulgrew is in Albany. Open Mic: Speaker 1: union supported me putting together programs for students when principal didn’t. Speaker 2: Dental plan (dentist dropped; th
UFT Financial Report: Executive Board Minutes 4/8/2024
Summary/Analysis Further analysis to come later – unofficial minutes below. Open mic: Speaker from elementary school in D1: dental insurance, myself and people in my school are paying out of pocket a lot in terms of care, can’t find dentist who takes insurance, or we get dropped because g
UFT Leadership to Paras: ‘you already have it pretty good – don’t usurp our bargaining authority by fighting for a living wage!’ – DA Summary/Minutes/Analysis, 3/20/24
Summary/Analysis: The headline from tonight comes from the very end of the meeting – Unity’s bizarre handling of the paraprofessional resolution. Readers may remember that I motivated Migda Rodriguez, Marie Wausnok, and Daniel Alicea’s resolution at executive board on Monday, only to see i
Will the UFT Fight for Paras to Have a Living Wage? UFT Executive Board Summary, Analysis, and Informal Minutes, 3/18/24
Summary/Analysis: There’s more to analyze, as always, but I’ll leave the rest to the reader. For the full informal minutes, including the official minutes from previous meetings as approved just after the open mic period, see below. Open Mic: Name intentionally redacted: teacher who made comment
What are we actually doing to fix Tier 6?
For months now, UFT members have been told that ‘Tier 6 will be fixed,’ and that for UFT, NYSUT, or the AFL-CIO to get it fixed, we’d need to donate to COPE. In a longer piece, I wrote about this general strategy, which unfortunately had all the fixings of an advertisement to get members to [&