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| (Internationalist photo) |
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(Top and Bottom: Internationalist photos)
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On January 5, I attended a rally of hundreds of angry school bus drivers at
City Hall. Below is a report-back
from the rally:
Hundreds of angry school bus
drivers – unionists from school bus locals ATU 1181 and Teamster local 854 came
out today. They were protesting Bloomberg's attempt to break their unions – a
strike looms.
For 34 years the bus drivers have “followed
the work” taking jobs according to a union seniority list. Now Bloomberg and
the DOE [Department of Education] want to give the contract to new companies
who are the lowest bidders and who will staff the buses with their own
non-union people at far lower pay scales.
A terrible idea for workers and
terrible for kids. The drivers explained to me today that having the
responsibility of up to 55 children on a bus requires skill, judgment and
experience. Especially working with special needs children who sometimes will
not even get in the bus, or settle in unless they know and trust the driver.
Drivers have to learn the best ways to relate to kids, resolve bullying and
anxiety issues all while dealing with the road and getting kids to school and
home safe.
Of course none of this concerns
the mayor in his frenzy of
privatizing and union-bashing.
We will surely be called on to
stand with and defend school bus drivers fighting a life-and-death struggle to
defend seniority and the existence of their union in the upcoming weeks.
The mayor tried to destroy our
seniority rules in layoffs last year but had to back down. Now he is going
after the drivers.
“An injury to one is an injury to
all!”
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| (Top: Internationalist photo; Bottom: Associated Press photo) |
Picket lines went up on January 16, and the CSEW was there
at the picket lines at 6:30 a.m., and again in the afternoon after school. We
got a terrific reception. When we showed up at the location on Metropolitan
Avenue in Ridgewood, Queens, people yelled out “the teachers are here” and put
me in front of the TV cameras right away. They need and really appreciate our
support. In fact, one of the strikers’ chants in the afternoon was “Thank you
for your support.” When we came back
in the afternoon, people rushed to grab our signs. A CSEW sign saying “UFT
Teacher Supports School Bus Drivers’ Strike” was featured in one of the
union-bashing tabloids.
The next day was the UFT delegate assembly on the teacher
evaluation negotiations. It turned into a huge event, with a protest of about
100 people outside and a full house in the D.A., plus hundreds more teachers in
an overflow room – maybe 2,000 people altogether. We passed out hundreds of
leaflets for a January 25 CSEW forum on this and the school bus drivers strike.
The CSEW had signs saying “No to Union-Busting Teacher Evals!” None of the
other signs even mentioned the union-busting issue, much less the fact (noted
in our leaflet) that the Democrats and Republicans were united in this
onslaught against educators.
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| (Associated Press photo) |
The delegate assembly itself was dominated by the
announcement earlier in the afternoon that Bloomberg had torpedoed the
teacher-evaluation deal and supposedly cost the city a quarter-billion dollars
in school aid. UFT president Mike Mulgrew insisted he was ready to sign off on
the deal. If it had gone through, it would have put thousands of teachers’ jobs
in jeopardy. But Bloomberg’s intransigence thwarted Mulgrew’s treachery, for
now.
At the D.A., I put up a motion calling for the UFT to call
a massive labor rally to support the striking drivers. The motion read:
RESOLVED, that the United Federation of Teachers pledges
its full support to the school bus drivers and matrons of ATU Local 1181 in
their struggle to uphold employee protection provisions, that is to save their
jobs and protect students against the union-busting attack by Mayor Bloomberg.
To hold a mass rally of all NYC labor and parents no later than February 1 in
support of the strikers.
Until then, nobody had said boo about the
school bus drivers. In response, Mulgrew pretended to support the strikers, but
he balked at any mention of a mass rally. A good number of delegates voted to
put the motion on the floor – one report said a majority – but since under the
UFT’s peculiar rendering of Robert’s Rules of Order it required a two-thirds
vote to put it on this month’s agenda, the UFT bureaucracy was able to keep it
from coming before the body.
On January 26, Class Struggle Education Workers will host
a forum-discussion at the CUNY Grad Center to call for “Mobilize NYC Labor to
Win the School Bus Drivers Strike”
and to say “Stop Teacher Eval Union Busting.” Please come out on Friday,
January 25 at 4:30 pm, CUNY Graduate Center, 365 5th Avenue, at 34th St, Room
5414.
– Marjorie Stamberg, CSEW, UFT Delegate, District 79
– Marjorie Stamberg, CSEW, UFT Delegate, District 79
Teachers union and Class Struggle Education Workers activist Marjorie Stamberg was shown on Channel 4 recently making a powerful statement in defense of the striking school bus drivers and aides.