USA: Senators restrict public-sector and teacher unions' rights

Republicans in the Wisconsin state senate have approved a regressive plan to strip public-sector and teacher trade unions of most of their collective bargaining rights.

The US state's 14 Democratic senators had sought to prevent the move by fleeing the state, leaving the chamber short of the number needed for a vote, but the Republicans used a rarely used procedural move to allow them to vote on the measure in committee instead.

Crowds of protesters from EI's U.S. affiliates, the AFT and NEA, swamped the state capitol in Madison following the vote.

"The whole world is watching," they shouted as police guarded the entrance to the senate chamber. In the senate gallery, spectators shouted "you are cowards" as voting took place.

The plan has prompted weeks of protests in support of public workers and teachers.

The Republican-controlled state assembly is due to take up the legislation on Thursday morning, after which it will go to Republican Governor Scott Walker for signature.

Mr Walker argues the move is needed to help tackle a $3.6bn budget gap over the next two years but the education unions have said it is intended to weaken the power of the unions, which tend to back the Democrats in elections.

The Democrats had called for the Republicans to compromise over public-sector unions' bargaining rights.

But Mr Walker's proposal was approved by a special conference committee after it was stripped of financial measures, meaning that a quorum was no longer needed in the Senate. No Democrats were present to vote against the legislation. Republican Senator Dale Schultz cast the only 'no' vote.

In a statement published on his website, Governor Walker said: "I applaud the legislature's action today to stand up to the status quo and take a step in the right direction to balance the budget and reform government."

He added that the state's Democratic senators - who fled to neighbouring Illinois nearly three weeks ago to block a vote - had had plenty of chances to come back to Wisconsin and act.

Democratic senate minority leader, Mark Miller, said the Republicans had shown disrespect for the people of Wisconsin and their rights: "Tonight, 18 senate Republicans conspired to take government away from the people. Tomorrow we will join the people of Wisconsin in taking back their government."

State unions had said they would agree to Mr Walker's proposed changes to their benefits - which would amount to an eight per cent pay cut - as long as they retained collective bargaining rights.

National Education Association President, Dennis Van Roekel, said: “These are actions more fitting for comic book arch-villains. A new crop of state leaders have launched blistering attacks on working families disguised as budget and education reforms, and many have sought to strip workers’ rights to have a voice through their union.”

EI General Secretary, Fred van Leeuwen, said: “Educators around the world are behind their U.S. colleagues, and strongly condemn this assault on trade union members’ basic right to collective bargaining.

“Those political leaders who attack education workers with such regressive moves, fail to understand that successful education reform cannot be achieved without the involvement and consent of teachers, education workers and their school communities. EI will make this point, among others, to ensure that the teacher voice is heard at next week’s International Summit on the Teaching Profession in New York, where we will advocate for a strong and respected teaching workforce in all countries.”

source:http://www.ei-ie.org/en/news/show.php?id=1555&theme=rights&country=usa

Aid Cuts Have Texas Schools Scrambling

HUTTO, Tex. — The school superintendent in this rural town outside the state capital has taken steps to trademark the district’s oddly un-Texan school mascot — the Hutto Hippo — in a frantic effort to raise cash. He is also planning to put advertisements on school buses and to let retailers have space on the school Web site.

Case Sherva, a fifth grader, helped a teacher, Paul Suddeth, lower the Texas state flag after school at Veterans’ Hill Elementary School in Hutto, Tex. State budget cuts are forcing the district to close the three-year-old school.

“I’m doing some weird stuff in the district because we are low on money,” said the superintendent, Douglas Killian, sitting in an office full of Hippo figurines.

He added, “We hope to make our hippo as recognizable as Mickey Mouse.” (The mascot was adopted shortly after a hippopotamus escaped from a circus train in 1915 and took up temporary residence in a local creek.)

But the money expected from the sale of “Hustling Hippos” merchandise would be peanuts compared with the hole expected to open up in the district’s budget, as the Legislature moves to slash about $4.8 billion in state aid to schools over two years to close a budget gap.

So Mr. Killian and the beleaguered school board have agreed to shut down a recently built grade school and to cut a 10th of the staff, among them a principal, 2 assistant principals, 4 librarians and 38 teachers. That round of staff cuts is a just first step, he says, and layoffs will follow if the budget bills proposed in the Legislature are enacted without changes.

All across Texas, school superintendents are bracing for the largest cuts to public education since World War II, and the state is not alone. Schools across the country are in trouble as billions in emergency stimulus grants from the federal government have run out, and state and federal lawmakers have interpreted the victory of fiscal hawks in November’s midterm elections to mean that tax increases are out of the question.

Nowhere has that political trend been more potent than in Texas, where Republicans who ran on a promise to never raise taxes not only retained every statewide office, but also added to their majorities in both houses of the Legislature.

Gov. Rick Perry, easily re-elected in November, made it clear in his annual speech to lawmakers last week that he regarded raising revenue for schools as out of the question, saying Texas families “sent a pretty clear message with their November votes.” He has also refused to consider using $9.4 billion in a reserve fund to bail out the schools.

“They want government to be even leaner and more efficient,” Mr. Perry said, “and they want us to balance the budget without raising taxes on families and employers.”

To balance the budget with cuts alone, the governor and Republican leaders in the Legislature have put forth bills that would reduce the state’s public school budget by at least 13 percent — nearly $3.5 billion a year — and would provide no new money to schools for about 85,000 new students that arrive in Texas every year. School administrators predict that as many as 100,000 school employees would have to be laid off to absorb the cuts.

Not only are the proposed cuts to school aid draconian, but in addition the Legislature in 2006 put strict limits on how much districts can raise local property taxes. That means local school boards find themselves trapped amid rising enrollment, double-digit drops in state aid and frozen local taxes.

Many school administrators attribute the current budget crisis to an overhaul of the school finance system five years ago, which Mr. Perry and Republican leaders pushed through in response to popular anger over high property taxes. The Legislature put a cap on property taxes for schools and promised to make up the difference with a new business tax. But that tax has never produced enough revenue to make the districts’ budgets whole.

The chronic shortfall in money for schools was papered over in the last two-year budget passed in 2009. Mr. Perry and Republican leaders in the Legislature used about $3.3 billion in federal aid under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act to plug the hole. That aid has disappeared this year.

“We had a problem before the shortfall ever occurred,” said John M. Folks, the superintendent of Northside Independent School District in San Antonio. “Now we have put this shortfall on top of an already horrible funding situation.”

Mr. Folks said the proposed budget bills would require him to cut about a sixth of his budget, and he sees see no way to avoid laying off teachers and letting classes become larger.

source:http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/15/education/15texas.html?ref=education