Executive Board Minutes, 4-11-2022

6:02 PM, Mulgrew starts (on way to another meeting): Over the weekend had a phenomenal high school ceremony, thanks Janella Hinds, talks of all the fun. Said lots of fun at middle school event, thanks Rich. Had a whole bunch of friends at Black and Puerto Rican caucus, says to make sure to get tested. This Thursday will be the ‘listen up’ – great group of teachers talking to people in power over education. Last night before the break, want to end it working as much as we can.

Budget: Thanks everyone for efforts. We did really well, because of the lobbying of this union. We’ve gotten creative due to the pandemic. 475 million dollar increase, CFE is fully funded. It’s done, never thought we’d get there. Mental health, 100 million dollars for schools – community, etc. Teacher center up to 20+ million. United Community Schools, not DOE, 450,000 from NYS. Well done to Karen. Childcare, big boost: from 200 to 300%. Got market rate moved positively, thanks Tammy.

Tier 6: Thanks Debra Penny. Asked them to do a Tier 4 analysis, a long fight. In 1983, Tier 4 was passed, no one happy. First year of reform was 1998, 15 years after initial passing to start undoing that damage. 2012, Tier 6 on a Thursday night at 11:45 PM, had a bad phone call. 2022, and we have started the reform of Tier 6. Major piece driving Mulgrew crazy, we’ve had 11,000 members leave under Tier 6. When they see they’re working til 63, that’s not going to work. Forget the contributions they have to pay that other tiers don’t have to. The entire AFL-CIO, our trustees, were all working on this, a collaboration across the state. Vesting is now 5 years instead of 10. None of our members will ever know this. There is a 2 year lag. For this year, your contributions will be based off of what you made in 2020. Last year, we had all sorts of extra money paid to different titles. On top, we won thousands of operational complaints that led to multi-thousand dollar checks, and this won’t count toward pension contributions. Big deal. We’re saying as a union that we have just started the journey to fix this. We’ve never had 11,000 people leave in the first ten years of a tier. Thanks everyone again for doing that lobbying. Thanks everyone for getting to this point.

Down 2,000 safety agents, so we can’t do a safe corridors program. Need to be able to get students away from schools safely. Tragic events.

LeRoy Barr: Moves to accept all minutes; they pass unanimously.

Ballots are out. People are holding them up on the screen. Please spread the word, they should have come in a golden envelope. Tell people to look for the envelope, fill it out, and send it back. We want a high voter turnout. Don’t wait for after the vacation. Due back by May 9th, but we’re not waiting until May 9th. Vote right away.

Next DA is Wednesday, 4/13. New May date is 5/25.

Report from Districts:

Rich Mantell: Middle school conference, big success. Shout out to Jamie Polzin for her class. May 14th, 5K in Coney Island. Raising money for schools in Ukraine.

Anthony Harmon: Black and Puerto Rican Caucus, acknowledges Janella Hinds who was given an award at the labor luncheon. Thanks United Community Schools people.

Janella Hinds: Acknowledges Anthony Harmon for chairing the labor luncheon. Friday, academic high school awards were held in Shanker Hall. Was amazing to have people there again. Celebrated 2022 and 2021 award winners. Thanks everyone who was able to join as Shanker Hall was transferred into a lovely cocktail space to celebrate the award winners.

(Name missed): College scholarships going out a week from today. Issue with web portal, figuring it out. Acknowledges Liz Perez, newest trustee. Thanks for income threshold increase. More can apply now.

Special Order of Business: In Support of Starbucks and Amazon Unions:

Arthur Goldstein speaks to resolution: Starbucks and Amazon run by billionaires who don’t want unions, which is a disgrace. Some really bad conditions in the US for a number of decades now. The cure to many of those conditions is unions. The resolution says the union is the creation of middle class, that stands against bigotry, racism, and discrimination. MLK was a big proponent of unions. We need to support these people. It’s important that we do everything we can do spread unionism.

Janella: Asks for support on the resolution. 62nd anniversary for our union. Young people are out here doing it, and it’s on us to support those who want to organize.

Amy Arundell: Chris Smalls, Amazon union leader spoke at the Black and Puerto Rican Caucus event. A lot for us to learn in closed shops from young people organizing who can lose their jobs. This brings us back to our roots.

Resolution passes unanimously.

Special Order of Business, Election Complaints:

LeRoy Barr: This time I’ll read it slowly so everyone can understand. This challenge alleges improper use of union and employer resources as well as text violations.

Elections held this year. 2022 election committee has reps from each of the two caucuses running slates, Unity and United for Change. I recommend that the complaint be upheld and that United for Change be directed to cease all campaign activity on employer-paid time and cease all use of employer/union resources. United for Change should also remove identified members and end texting to people who don’t have consent.

1. UFC sent campaign materials to people who did not subscribe to mailing list. UFC explains that their distribution list comes from EONYC and MORE mailing lists, both of which are part of UFC. In addition, members can sign up in many other places to get mailings. Unclear how they got on mailing list, but no violation. It should be rejected.
2. Members called teachers on school hours during instructional time. Call was passed through to her classroom. This is a clear violation of LMRDA. While it is unknown if the member was on their own DOE time, they were calling a DOE line to talk to a teacher. No reason to know if UFC knew they were calling a DOE number, but when a secretary answered the call, they should have hung up. This allegation should be upheld. UFC should be directed to not call members at school during school hours.
3. UFC texted members who have not subscribed to a UFC phone list. There is a text campaign being sent out to people who never subscribed. Again, the UFC list is an amalgam of lists from MORE and EONYC, both part of the coalition, among other ways. Unclear how member phone number came onto the list. Accordingly, UFC lists may be a violation. Telephone Consumer Protection Act. UFC should remove person from contact list and cease making texts to people from whom they don’t have consent.
4. One UFC candidate used DOE email to send campaign, asking for non-DOE emails. This is a clear violation, and the UFC candidate seems to be aware of this since she asked for non-DOE emails, but used employer resources to do this. Attempts were made to reach her to see if she took a personal day, but she was unavailable. Regardless, this is a violation, so the allegation should be upheld. Cease and desist.
5. UFC used a UFT google group to seek assistance on UFC campaigning, specifically on inexpensive copying. Candidate should be asked to cease and desist. Mike Sill takes motion to accept. So moved. No one speaks for or against. Unanimously passes. Motion to adjourn.