In yesterday's New York Daily News the paper published an article that claimed that the City and UFT are closing in on a seven year contract that apparently will include the two 4% raises and the "retroactivity" that goes along with it. According to the article the contract runs from 2009 to 2015 or seven years and includes raises totaling 15% (4%,4%,0%,1%,2%,2%,2%). However, excluding the two 4% increases from the last "City pattern", the final five years will total 7% and quite probably establish a new "City pattern" for all the Municipal unions.
If the Daily News article is to be believed then the new "City pattern" will be 7% for five years and is totally inadequate when compared to other recently negotiated settlements in the Metropolitan area. For example the TWU/MTA agreement gives the members 8.25% for five years and also includes significant benefit enhancements that amount to another 2% annually. While the SEIU 32BJ (doormen and handymen) settled for a 11.3% increase for four years!. Finally a federal mediation board recommended a 17.3% raise for six years for Long Island Railroad workers. All of these contracts are significantly better than the proposed coontract between the City and the UFT. Below is the breakdown of the raises for the various contracts.
Union..............Raise...........Years.............Annual Raise
LIRR.............17.0%................6......................2.83%
32BJ............11.3%................4.......................2.83%
TWU..............8.25%...............5.......................1.65%
UFT...............7.00%...............5.......................1.40%
Note, the TWU contract includes significant benefit enhancements such as a universal pass for all MTA transportation facilities, improved death benefits, optical and eyeglass coverage and paid maternity leave that is estimated as about 2% annually.
I could understand a 7% increase for five years if there was zero inflation and if the City was in dire economic straights but that's not the case. First, inflation in the New York City Metropolitan area has averaged 2.2% for the last three years (2011-13). According to the proposed contract, we would get raises of 0%, 1%, and 2% in those three years for an average raise of 1%. Moreover, the City has been seeing major surpluses as the economic environment has continued to improve. In fact, Economist James Parrott of the Fiscal Policy Institute found that the City can afford to give "full retroactive raises" and modest raises for the new "City pattern". This is because the City's has experienced a large jump in tourism, stock market gains (30% last year), increased tax receipts, higher real estate prices, and lower unemployment. Mr Parrott's analysis correlates with Mel Levy's breakdown of the City's budget and shows the City's has surpluses that allow for adequate raises for Municipal employees as well as full "retroactive raises".
Hopefully, the union realizes that the City is hiding much larger surpluses than they claim and that the City's ever improving economic condition allows for raises that at least equals the inflation rate as well as full "retroactive pay". How will the retroactive pay be handled? The "devil will be in the details" but I suspect it will be stretched out to the end of the new contract, Finally, I hope the union is not trading Time for money That is totally unacceptable.
Update: The new York Times has reported that the City and the UFT has agreed to a 9 year contract and will be announced on Thursday, Here. The Wall Street Journal reports that the ATR rotation will be eliminated as well Here.
43 comments:
How Will Retro $$$$$$ Be Dispensed ?
3 years 5 years ???? Chaze knows all . Please tell us .
Relax, don't worry...all is good. Mikey Mulgrew's house is fine, with all of the MILLIONS Sister Kate Mulgrew raked in from the Bloomberg administration.
And yes...you will be further sold out with this contract due to Mikey's corruption. However, we don't have a cretin as Mayor this time around, so we will do better only due to DeBlasio- who does have a heart.
Even Mikey can't screw that up.
7% over 5 years would be a disgrace, plain and simple.
The big problem I can also see is that if the UFT throws a crappy tentative contract for the rank and file to ratify, it will be sucked up in a second by all the newbie teachers. They will scream, "Awesome, we are getting a 15% raise!" Veteran teachers, including Chazz understand it is just smoke and mirrors if you look at the big picture. Lastly, all the teachers were talking today about the what the possibility is with the added or subtracted instructional time. Are we going to swap the 37 1/2 minutes of tutoring for PD? I have been telling teachers this contract is going to be the biggest thing since 2005. It is either going to be a good deal or we are going to get screwed again.
And not just new teachers looking for some money, but senior teachers looking to bail out asap; I imagine most of them would take it, also...
If Mulgrew can get those numbers without any other givebacks - since he made pre emptive givebacks with RttP, APPR and Danielson - then I think the contract would be overwhelmingly ratified.
In '05 there were quite a few vets who were happy with the pay increase- and didnt give a twit about everything we gave up.
All The City has to do is wave a little bit of green , some sizzle to it...and it's a done deal. The younger ones would sell out the ATRs in a second- though there's no way that's n the table.
I can tell you right now that the Daily News article was bogus. 100% false. It is an embarrassment that even the Daily News would print such a fake story. Was at HQ today and the big people I know for years told me everyone's laughing, that article was a bizarre stretch. Few people know the inner dealings and there are no leaks whatsoever.
Be serious, the contract will be ratified unless its 10 years of zero plus givebacks. This contract mentioned will easily get through.
I guess offering service credit to certain veterans might be in The City's best interests. However, these credits would have to be linked to immediate retirement.
The union painted a rosy picture with the 2005 contract. That contract allowed Bloomy to close schools, reopen new ones and not have to hire the staff. The union should not have even presented that to us, and when they did it's full ramifications should have been explained. I think the union should focus on the abysmal working conditions. Most teachers are not leaving because of poor pay. Indeed the few I know have taken steep salary cuts just to leave. I met one teacher (50 years old,15 years experience) working in Lord and Taylor's. I met another ( a devout Jewish lady) working in a Catholic school- both much happier. I personally, and I don't think I'm alone on this, would like service credit. I love teaching, but being an ATR is babysitting, and I know there's very little chance we'll be put back in the classroom. Even if they do, we'll be glorified aides or targeted.
Why would any of us listen or believe this story from the daily news?? The Daily News?? The paper that has been publishing articles we know are so far from the truth that we are laughing our brains out..But now some of us are "believing" a story from the Daily News yellow journalism. Remember all, this is an evil publication which seeks to prey on people by making up stories that the naive general public always believes
Anon 9:28 is right about lack of leaks. No talk coming from any union people.
Screw Campbell Brown too!!! I remember when she was having an affair with her producer at NBC. Who the hell does she think she is?
ANON 10 56
Was she cheating on her husband?? That would be a juicy story to send to the press to give her a taste of her own medicine. HEADLINE: FORMER CNN NEWS REPORTER ON HOT SEAT FOR ALLEGED CHEATING SCANDAL" Let her experience a little yellow journalism
C. Brown is some 1% Ho...doin work for her hedge fundy Macdaddy...shes mainstream media scum...all so she can be invited to the right parties during the Hamptons social season...and the best tables at the hot restaurants ....we are less than grunts to her...
It really won't matter whatever dollars are thrown at us after six years of nothing and thirteen years of abuse. The plan is to torture teachers. Plain and simple. There is absolutely zero evidence to show working for the D.O. E . , that conditions improved since the new boss took over.
There has been no action or lip service to suggest that things will improve in the future.
Angry Nog
The Daily Tampon and NY Pox should only be read for comic relief. Those two rags are as far removed from journalism as the UFT is from being a union.
http://t.co/GNKMewGZHB
Yea baby. May 1st announcement. 9 year 18-20% raise.
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/05/01/nyregion/new-york-said-to-be-on-verge-of-9-year-deal-with-teachers-union.html?referrer=
7:09 p.m. Anon--
Boy, I sure hope that's a bunch of baloney. I do not want to be locked into a 9 year contract at inferior raise rates compared to other unions and handing over L-rd knows what other givebacks they'll ask for. Of course, Mulgrew is just dumb enough to fall for this garbage.
"This person said there will likely be an expedited dismissal process for these teachers. The contract will say that when there is an opening, a teacher in the pool with the right credentials in that district will be put in the slot, but a principal can remove the teacher quickly if there is evidence the placement isn't working, this person said." I don't like this. what does dismissal mean?
Almost zero money after first 2 years. And don't like atr clause.
Todays Wall St Journal has disturbing news regarding the proposed contract and how it resolves the ATR plight.
I hope what I was just informed of by a professor is inaccurate. She stated that ATRS would be given one year to find a job. After that we would be terminated. If there is any truth in that...how do you terminate a tenured teacher? It didn't wash the last time they tried that.
There's no ATR time limit. We will be applying for vacancies and be back into the classroom next school year.
And force placed?
But what if there are no vacancies in your content area
Jenny Sedlis of some network is a real piece of work. This neophyte has the gall to think that what she says has something to do with the new UFT contract. I mean, who are these people?? Can't the get a regular job? What is it exactly that they do all day??? Sit around and wait for a chalkbeat article to comment on?? Oh yeah, this vulture was associated with evil moskowitch and now its all coming together....They all kiss bloombergs ass cause he is funding there ridiculous "organization". An organization which does nothing and is useless to society but this is the world we live in now...there are so many people here in NYC now that there are actually people like jenny sidlis and the witch
We've been applying every year. There are no CTE positions. The union should push service credit so we can get out. I don't understand how anyone could get excited about this proposed contract. Our working conditions are awful and that's what should be remedied.
18%!!!!! Top pay 118K!!!!! It's real!!!! I think between this raise, per session, and summer school, I will be making more than my principal (and my dentist).
lectronic,” the union added.
The Daily News reported some wins for the city that the UFT did not trumpet, such as a streamlined process for terminating teachers accused of sexual misconduct and a change to the the Absent Teacher Reserve, the pool of teachers who are on the city’s payroll but lack a teaching position. Under the deal, those teachers would get tryout periods at schools, after which they would be subject to an expedited termination hearing if the schools’ principals do not approve of their performance, the Daily News reports.
No doubt the UFT gave away due process rights for ATR's that would be in keeping with the trampling of teachers rights that has been part and parcel of the collusion between theDepartment Of Dead from the neck up and the UFT which is the H.R. Enforcement arm of the DOE. We pay for that benefit.
Take the oxymoronic "expedited due process" that screwed teachers out of careers. Another example of the total sellout would be Mildew embracing the VAM and Advance unemployment line.
We are going to be screwed wholesale. This time when we grab our ankles and squeal there will not be any lubrication or even a courtesy reach around.
The greedy swine who are our so called colleagues will ratify this piece of shit for the filthy lucre. Newbies and those ready to bail.
Conditions will worsen and so will our shared misery.
Dismissal means what it really is an end run around the kangaroo court of the 3020a.
Pay more for healthcare and get no interest on money already earned and it will be doled out in such a niggardly way that it will mean nothing after Uncle Sam gets his pound of flesh.
Yet again another contract on teachers. We are well and truly screwed.
Cheers,
Angry Nog
Watching Mulgrew and his smarmy attitude during the circle jerk that was called a press conference it's very easy to conclude that the deal is a total sellout.
We are well and truly fucked if we ratify this piece of dog shit.
Farina is clearly senile. The mayor must be on some anti anxiety medication. Just a little too merry and Mildew, well, what a scumbag.
We ratify this garbage for a measly thousand dollars signing bonus. That will be nothing pensionable and after tax will translate into a true boning.
Enjoy
Buyouts Included in this Contract! Please!!!! There will be a mass exodus of Teachers leaving this debacle.
It's a great day. If you feel otherwise, you are probably a clinically depressed person who is miserable.
You were so sure the union wouldn't see us out. Well you were WRONG!
Let me get this straight...The 8% was given to us because others got it. We agreed to 10% over 7 years, totally backloaded, gave up time, got 0 plus 0 for 2011 and 2012, the get 1 % per year from 2013-2016. And retro get paid 5 years from now? That's pathetic.
Do I have this right, retro is between 2015-2020? That's crazy.
What exactly is the ATR severance package?
There is no ATR package. They just fire you. Suck on that!
very quiet chaz!!!!!!
Chaz,
You state, "of course, the ATR pool will be drained by the proposed buyout."
Do you have any details on the atr buyout?
Do you really believe that the generosity of the buyout is going to induce mid-career teachers to leave in droves?
Chaz, are those who just retired while waiting on a contract included? BTW my thoughts are with the ATRs. I spent one year in ATR hell. I was lucky to be hired. You know the ATRs are going to get screwed with this contract. Such a disgrace. Keep on pressing on, Chaz.
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