By Victor Skinner
EAGnews.org

KINNELON, N.J. – Parents, students and school board members in New Jersey’s Kinnelon school district are learning a hard lesson about ruthless union negotiation tactics.

The Kinnelon Education Association, the district’s teachers union, is willing to deny full educational services to students until a new collective bargaining agreement is negotiated, NorthJersey.com reports.

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The KEA apparently convinced its members to perform only the minimal requirements in the expired teachers contract, which stipulates teachers must only help students after school one day per week, according to the news site.

So Kinnelon teachers are only staying after school for struggling students on Thursdays, with the exception of stipend-funded supplemental math and language lessons held on other days.

School board trustees took issue with the union’s selfish attitude at a board meeting last week.

“I think this is very sad. We’ve raised the bar for our kids and now they’re going to hurt the kids they are trying to help. I think it’s an outrage. They hurting the same children they are teaching. It’s a true shame. I’m ashamed as a board member and there’s nothing we can do about it,” school board trustee Katie Stylianou said.

“The reality is they’re using this to force our hand,” board President Margaret Zybrick said, according to North Jersey.com. “They’re trying to strong arm us.”

That’s how the world works for school employee unions. If a public employer isn’t willing to give the union what it wants, union bosses will use any means necessary, including holding the student learning process hostage.

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Most public school districts, including Kinnelon, can’t afford union demands, especially when there has been virtually no improvement in student achievement that might justify higher salaries or more expensive benefits.

In New Jersey, state lawmakers recognized the burden that public sector labor expenses have imposed on taxpayers in recent years and capped annual budget increases at 2 percent. That means schools can legally only give their employees so much.

Kinnelon school officials budgeted a 12 percent increase in health insurance costs for next year, NorthJersey.com reports. Runaway costs could push that percentage up by several points.

“Board member Keith Dama said in prior years, the district’s (labor cost) increases were passed onto the taxpayers, but now taxpayers are protected with the 2-percent cap. Roughly 97 percent of the district’s budget must fall within the cap,” the news site reports.

“Dama said health benefits account for $4 million of the district’s $36.3 million budget. If health benefits go up 14 percent next year, that will mean a $600,000 increase, which is the equivalent of the entire 2-percent cap increase.”

That means, under the law, there will be nothing left for increased salaries or other expensive perks. But apparently financial realities don’t concern the union leadership. The union wants what it wants, the law and the students be damned.

The worst part is that the union’s selfish attitude will put struggling students farther behind, and there’s little the school board can do about it.

Kinnelon board member Marianne DeAlessi “warned that test scores will drop if students are not given more flexible access to extra help. A decrease on test scores will be a reflection on the teachers, she said.”

“A contract is one thing and professionalism is another,” DeAlessi said, according to NorthJersey.com.