Just about everything we need to know about the city's budget is in the Independent Budget Office Analysis of the Mayor's 2019 Budget. For those who want to skip to the part about raises for municipal employees, go to pages 17-18. The city's bargaining strategy is right there for all to see.
Labor Reserve.
Most city agency budgets have little or no growth in the plan period because their budgets do not include funding for the potential cost of future labor settlements. Instead, the city centrally budgets for these costs, setting aside money in a labor reserve to cover the planned costs of upcoming labor settlements. The current financial plan includes $586 million in 2018, $1.5 billion in 2019, $1.8 billion in 2020, $2.3 billion in 2021 and $1.7 billion in 2022 in the labor reserve, enough to fund increases of 1 percent each year in future settlements.(bold added by ICEBLOG)
IBO estimates that currently nearly 104,000 of the city’s 307,772 full-time employees, just over one third of the workforce, are working under the terms of expired collective bargaining agreements. Absent any agreements between the city and its labor unions, by the end of 2018 nearly 43 percent of all full-time city employees will be working without a contract. If labor contracts are not agreed to by the end of 2019, nearly the entire city workforce will be working under the terms of expired contracts.
The city typically sets wages through “pattern bargaining,” where the first major union to reach a labor settlement sets the pattern for wage increases for the city’s other unions. When contract terms are reached, pay increases are usually applied retroactively to the date of the prior contract’s expiration.
One uncertainty is the possibility that unions may attempt to negotiate for paid parental leave, which has currently only been implemented for most of the city’s managerial level workers. The United Federation of Teachers, which represents the city’s single largest collective bargaining unit, has publicly expressed interest in the benefit; a spokesperson for the City’s Office of Labor Relations estimated the cost to provide paid parental leave to teachers at $250 million a year.
1% increases is what the city is setting aside for salary increases. We have to pay for paid parental leave or anything else we want.
Michael Mulgrew should soon be saying the city is broke.
What was the city's surplus at the end of the 2017 fiscal year?
Glad you asked:
IBO reports that "the city ended 2017 with a surplus of nearly $4.2 billion." (page 18) But, UFT members still have to wait until 2020 to receive in full money we earned from 2009-11.
If we want more than 1%, either we pay for it with concessions somewhere else (think more health givebacks) or, perish the thought, we fight for it like a union.
For those who want to leave the union after the Supreme Court more than likely lets you stop paying dues in May or June: I very much doubt the city ups its offer to the unions if there are mass defections. We have to fight collectively if we want real raises and better working conditions.
35 comments:
2 points: 1) I knew all along that we will have to pay for maternity leave. 2) Janus will be an instant $1,400 "raise" for tons of teachers who are planning on quitting paying dues if we get a shitty contract in regard to working conditions. We will not blame the UFT for a shitty raise, we WILL blame the UFT if there are givebacks and if there is no change to the evaluation system.
THE Uft rep in my building stated ‘the city has no miney’
BS. I say we tell that tool of a mayor to keep his 1 percent nonsense.
Here is how i would take it.
1). No more Monday and Tuesday nonsense.
2). Only afternoon parent teacher conferences. No nights anymore. The reason we have 4 is bc schools were doing a back to school night in September and mike Niall teachers were staying making everyone else look bad.
3). A return to s/u
4). 8am-220 uniform school day.
S/U can’t happen unless the NYS legislature changes the evaluation law. We can however, get 2 observations in the next contract if Mulgrew steps up to the plate. There will never be a uniform school day due SBO votes in certain schools. Monday and Tue times were negotiated in the 2005 contract in exchange for more pay so I don’t think that will go away. Lots of parents work all day and need evening parent conferences to take place at night so getting rid of evening conferences will not go away either. What we can get is 2 observations for tenured teachers and the elimination of the Danielson rubric for our evaluations. This must be a priority for the UFT so we can have a return to sanity to our daily lives in the schools of NYC.
Does this surprise anybody? As I said years ago, we set the rate for future deals with the last deal. They now they can either get us for 1% per year, or make us wait and go without a new deal, then make us wait forever for retro with no interest. Sad part is, this is from our friendly, liberal mayor, who we supported, after he gave us the worst contract in union history.
This mayor played, I meant paid, mulgrew. Guaranteed.
What would send the message for what the rank and file want? Mass organization. Once a month rank and file could do a peaceful protest of what is wanted on the next contract. This could include bringing mass attention to administrative harassment and abuses. Also, once the information about the contract is known and the rank and file do not agree, go on strike. It's got to be done!
We have somehow negotiated a 3% cost of living to a 1% cost of living, added more time, got a worse eval system, more observations, less discipline AND have allowed the city to hold retro for 11 years with no interest. People talk badly about 2005, and it certainly wasnt great, but we got 15% over roughly 5 years, and all retro upfront. 2007 we got 7% over 2 years, and that was an early contract. Still no hardship transfer even though it sin the contract, still field supervisors, still no placement for ATRs who want to be placed, etc...And what is the uft worth?
2005 contract we got 25% but we agreed to work MORE TIME! That was not a raise, that was working more time for more money. The UFT recently sent out an elementary teacher survey asking questions about what we would like to see in the next contract. I swear to God one of the questions asked about the possibility of teachers willing to work a longer day or year in exchange for higher pay. I would like to go on record right now and say a big, fat, no fucking way to that in our next contract. The UFT better not even entertain that possibility. This is not 2005 and the rank and file are not willing to provide a giveback in regard to working a longer day or year for possible peanut change for a “raise”.
I never minded evening parent conferences as long as parents showed up. In a way they were kind of fun, kids selling sweets in the halls, going out for a few brews after.
Thankfully I don't have to deal with the teacher torture, but it is unnecessary.
Keep the 1%. Give us some respect.
I used to work in a k-8 school and elementary school teachers are their own worst enemy.
Principals pit them against each other and they take the bait.
They’re threatened in a subtle way to do extra work. And they oblige.
They’ll come in Saturday’s without pay all to ‘make the principal happy’.
But it doesn’t work.
So when the Uft comes to us with more money for more work, elementary school teachers jump at it.
Principals know it too.
Go into an elementary school. Teachers over 30 years old are dinosaurs bc most quit in a few
No mother effing givebacks!!! Don’t even freakin’ think about it Mulgrew! We will strike. And by that, we will strike against the UFT. We will picket in front of your house, Mulgrew. Don’t you dare give an inch! We’re pissed. You’ve been couponing our contract for years, giving away the shop. The days of capitulation are over. Teachers are pissed. The spirit of WV lives here, too.
The UFT is a racket. The mayor was bemoaning he couldn’t hire his wife and I immediately thought of the UFT. Everyone’s friends and relatives are working there, including Mulgrew’s wife.
The UFT can take their idea of working a longer day or year for more pay and stuck it where the sun don’t shine. Janus is a couple of months away. We will pull our dues in a New York minute if they send us a shitty contract for ratification. This ain’t 2005. Social media has enlightened us all. We know the score. The days of the UFT trying to pull the wool over our eyes is over!
James, I think you need to count us among those working under an expired contract since we are *still* only working under a Memorandum of Agreement. De Blasio is like the student who never turns his homework in. Teachers: “Where’s our contract, Bill?”
de Blasio: “My Dog ate it.”
Teachers; “Not funny, Bill.”
50% will opt out of paying dues. They still get their two checks for doing nothing but eating.
1% is an just opening bid from the city. This union should counter with 5%.
The UFT better get aggressive and show some balls or they are going to soon be neutered. Their survival depends on delivering for membership. AND FAST.
I think many more teachers than anyone suspects are willing to strike for our working conditions. We want respect, an end to Danielson evaluation, Veteran teacher abuses and harassment, no more than 2 observations and limitations on unnecessary classroom visits, an end to Fair Student Funding strategies that impact ability to transfer from one school to another.
Granting parental leave in exchange for a 1% raise is unacceptable, West Virginia Teachers received 5%! The Mayor needs to tap into his surplus to pay for parental leave. No more give backs in time or health care benefits, we gave enough already and can barely make 200% increase in cost to go to emergency room if needed in life or death emergencies!
5% is a counter?! Bullshit. He just upped the Chancellor’s salary by *FIFTY* Percent! Are you kidding?! We’ll settle for a 50% raise too. So, what counteroffer should we put out that will get us to a 50% raise? Because he gave this guy 50% over the preveious woman who had the office. He thinks we shouldn’t kid paid men’s wages. I think de Blasio is about to have his own #MeToo moment when it comes to our contract negotiation.
If not for the Taylor law I would strike.
2 days pay for every day on strike isn’t worth it.
Who can be out of work 2-3 weeks and give back 4-6 weeks of pay?
What would help is a Uft leader not taking bribes and showing nepotism.
Oh, and I don’t blame mulgrew. He learned from weingarten.
All the people who view weingarten with rose colored glasses need a reality check too
The trade off on the penalty probably isn’t attractive for folks who are doing this job for a 2 year stint, or for those about to retire. But, if we want to restore this job to the status of a profession, a major strike will almost certainly be required.
Interesting that WV, OK, and KY are statewide actions. Koch, Broad, and Gates mandated statewide uniformity in teacher evaluations, and these states are finally responding by basically forming statewide bargaining units. NYC teachers have yet to admit out loud that Cuomo’s APPR system was effectively a takeover of all district schools in the state. Our response needs to be in proportion if we are ever to shake this awful system.
The city can keep their crappy raises.... I took this job for the pension I never expected to make real money in this job, but I also never expected the level of stress, disrespect and straight up abuse... that said I would take 1% but Danielson has to go...2 observations max, no test scores, Get rid of FSF, --
also they could keep my retro if I could get time instead - like if I could buy 1 year of pensionable time - they could have my retro... most of all I want a buyout 20/50@ 40% and yes I would strike for any and all of it! Completely support mini protests around the city and i curse the contract that made night time PTC... people work all different hours... why not a breaksfast and afterschool.... 8 pm is miserable
Give me 20/50 @40 pct That puts me at less than 10 years to leave a job that I regret going into.
I have a kid and nieces/nephews and I go overboard telling them not to do this job.
My kid won’t get a dime from me if she goes into teaching. And I mean it. I can’t indiscriminately spend on a college tuition for this awful job knowing how the doe will look to fire people once tier 4 is out.
Having said that, there is no more solidarity. Weingarten and Bloomberg are both responsible for that.
Klein told weingarten he wanted to kill the union and he sort of did. Fellows, teach for America, and leadership academy brought people in who are told that the unions are bad. And the millennials buy into it. They can’t see the forest through the trees.
Also, whoever said ‘parents work different times so we need night PTCs’. Shame on you for buying the rhetoric. LI schools have one back to school night and afternoon PTCs and guess what? Parents make it. Why? Bc they care.
I’ll take a nonsense raise if I get 20/50, a 6 hour and 20 minute school day, no Monday Tuesday nonsense and no more night PTCs
I’ll retire at 50 with a pension and go work at Home Depot in a cheaper state. I’ve worked at Home Depot and it was odd being treated like a human. Can’t say that about the doe
I've been in the system a long time and I have no problem at all going in strike while knowing I will be docked 2 days pay for each day that I strike. As the posters above mention, it is not about the money, it is about the working conditions. I have never been more stressed out in my life. 2 observations and the end of Danielson would go a very long way to improve the stress levels of teachers in NYC. I am thankful that the UFT is at least asking us what we think about our evaluation in the recent survey I took. I hope that they actually listen to the rank and file on this. Pretty much every teacher I know hates our current evaluation system as we all feel like we are walking on eggshells. Having 4 observations and being rated under Danielson is a moral killer that should be eliminated from the next contract. Even Danielson herself said her rubric should never be used to rate teachers for employment reasons. 2 observations in the NYS minimum law. We should have that in place for all tenured teachers. If any teacher really wants more observations, make that at choice for them at the start of the year. Veteran teachers are not probationary teachers and as such, should not be treated that way.
Let's make a deal! Ask for 5% like WV but I will take 1's across the board in exchange for:
No more Danielson
2 obs, real obs not drive-bys
A limit on the "walkthroughs"
6 hour 50 minute work day (I don't need 6:20 but I thank God I am back in a single session school instead of Monday and Tuesday detention)
Also on this topic the UFT was stupid when it instituted the 8am earliest start. On Staten Island at least, most schools started before 8, then the Principals didn't want to do SBO and the schedules changed. Huge PITA to get home after work and the parents hate it too as it cuts into sports practice, dance school etc.
Lastly the UFT HS survey had eliminating distributed scoring. Why they would want this I have no idea. Between Regents scoring and the Junior High scoring which we can also do, that's 80+ hours of per session. Even if you don't do the Junior High scoring it's 40+ hours Per Session for doing the same work we used to do for free.
The more I read these blogs the more I know that everybody thinks like me in wanting to gut our current evaluation system. I am I total agreement that we should only have 2 observations for tenured teachers and Danielson should be replaced with something that makes sense and is fair.
20/50 40% buyout please. 2 observations and no talk of funny longer days or years. In fact, why doesn't the DOE offer us shorter days in return for less of a bump.
Question: 25/55 happened a while back and I am very happy that I am enrolled in it. Does anybody know how it came to be and what would it take to negotiate a 20/50 at 40%?
I have never been more proud of being a member of the UFT than I was during the week we struck in Sept 1975. If we could pull off another strike it would do wonders for morale and solidarity
City and UFT agreed to 25-55 and went up to Albany to get it. We pay for benefit so no cost to city. It would take the same thing to get 20-50. I don't see city wanting it but one never knows.
20-50 at 40% makes so much sense.Veteran teachers want out asap. It would benefit the city in a bog way.
What incentive does the city have to do anything for us?
Look for a contract with a 2% raise but the city agrees to pay the retro money immediately
Deal
1% is what the city would pay if there were no union negotiating on our behalf
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