DANVILLE, Pa. – Danville teachers union officials seem poised to call a strike because they’re not getting their way at the collective bargaining table.
The school board president wants to open the union contract negotiations to the public, so taxpayers will understand how expensive union demands have become.
Disagreements between the two sides came to a head this week when members of the Danville Education Association voted to give union officials the authority to call a teachers strike, the Danville News reports.
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Danville school board president Allan Schappert responded with an invitation to open union contract negotiations to the public, a move that takes agreement from both sides.
“I would be happy to release to the public what our latest offer was if that’s okay with the union,” Schappert told the news site. “Let the people who finance this, the taxpayers, have an opportunity to comment.”
Union officials are upset school leaders don’t want to follow an arbitrator’s recommendations from earlier this year, which include a 2.5 to 3.2 percent pay increase for teachers for the 2012-13, 2013-14 and 2015-16 school years, as well as automatic step raises for this year and next, the Danville News reports.
District officials contend the arbitrator didn’t understand the cost of across-the-board percentage raises, as well as step increases.
“What he recommended is not affordable,” Schappert said.
The other problem, Schappert said, is that ever-increasing retirement and health care costs are also taking a toll on the school budget.
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Unfortunately, DEA president Dave Fortunato has dollar signs dancing in his head. He saw a report that listed a $3.2 million budget surplus for next year, so he thinks the district is rich.
“We don’t even need that much money,” Fortunato said.
District business manager Janis Venna, however, has said the $3.2 million will be used up by health care and retirement costs, the News reports.
Fortunato said he would have to confer with union negotiators before making any decision to let the public in on negotiations.
That’s typical. Union negotiators don’t want the public to understand what’s going on at the bargaining table because their demands are usually unnecessarily expensive, and often have no clear benefit for students.
It’s much easier for union officials to garner sympathy from the public when the public remains ignorant of the issues. It’s much more advantageous, from the union’s perspective, to hold student learning hostage with a teachers strike, and use public frustration over the strike to pressure school board members to cave in.
But Schappert is ahead of the game. He’s invited the public in.
That puts the ball in the union’s court, forcing them to choose between two very bad options.
DEA officials can refuse to negotiate in public – which would undoubtedly cause them to appear as though they have something to hide – or call a strike, which would tear the community apart and interrupt student learning.
Will labor leaders choose to settle the dispute honestly, in full view of the taxpayers, or will they take the cowardly way out and have the teachers abandon students midway through the school year?
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