Chicago Teachers Union and allied groups march downtown, then rally at City Hall after being locked out of Bruce Rauner's State of Illinois building... 'Day of actions' demands local revenue as well as 'Springfield solutions'...
The crowd at Chicago's City Hall filled the entire corridor on the first floor, from LaSalle St. through Clark St. Labor Beat photo.Hundreds of teachers, students, parents, and community leaders converged on Chicago's City Hall on June 22, 2016, in the latest in a series of protests demanding that Chicago fully fund its public schools. The actions included a sit-in at City Hall, speeches by various leaders, and some creative protesting art.
The CTU actions were planned for June 22 because it was the final "furlough day" for regular school teachers and PSRPs, most of whom are union members. The union distributed an elaborate press release outlining the various actions earlier in the day. (Disclosure: This reporter, a retired teacher and current union delegate representing retirees, mostly covered the City Hall part of the actions).
The CTU press release is below here:
Chicago teachers to turn furlough day into a 'fight back' day with June 22 protests in Loop
CHICAGO-As Chicago Public Schools continues to place all of its eggs into one Springfield basket, Chicago teachers and other school employees will take to the streets once again on June 22 to call on Mayor Rahm Emanuel to develop the will to fund schools and to stop giving his wealthy campaign donors public funds that could otherwise go toward students.
Many individual police officers assigned to watch the Chicago Teachrrs Union rally on Wednesday, June 22, 2016, were friendly and expressed support for the teachers -- but the official reaction was more hostile. When teachers at the rally marched from Chicago City Hall to the plaza in front of the James R. Thompson State of Illinois Building, the doors to the building were locked. To prevent anyone inside the building from opening the doors, the doorway area was sealed off with official yellow police tape. As seen on this photo between two protestors wearing CTU red T-shirts, the tape identified the rally as a "crime scene." The real crime was officials denying people the opportunity to exercise their First Amendment rights in a government building. Substance photo by David R. Stone
The Chicago Teachers Union has called on its 27,000 members to turn an imposed furlough day into a "fight back" day by converging on City Hall and sites throughout downtown to illustrate the call for just and progressive revenue solutions for schools.
Starting as early as 8:30 a.m. the Union, parents, students and other education justice activists will head to five target sites to illustrate the hypocrisy coming from the fifth floor of City Hall and Emanuel's handpicked school board. The demonstration will conclude with a rally and speak out at the Thompson Center to connect the dots between Governor Bruce Rauner's notorious "turnaround agenda" and the mayor's refusal to fully support public schools.
Below is a list of the simultaneous 8:30 a.m. actions:
WHO, WHERE, WHY
Larry Levy, River Point Plaza, 444 W. Lake St., Northeast corner of Lake and Canal
Larry Levy has donated thousands to Governor Rauner's campaigns and his restaurant company has been sued for minimum wage violations in Chicago. He is also helping fund the governor's campaign to change Illinois voting maps that would weaken the Black and Latino vote. He received $30 million in TIF funds for an unwanted luxury building downtown-money that could have gone to public schools.
Ken Griffin, Citadel Center, 131 Dearborn
Griffin is a "close friend" of the mayor. He said his greatest disappointment with Emanuel is that he only closed 50 schools in 2013-stating it should have been more than 100.
Even though the Citadel CEO is the wealthiest man in Illinois, state income tax rollbacks saved him an estimated $16 million in one year. Citadel is among the top hedge funds whose mega-profits are protected by Illinois, requiring no sales tax on high frequency trading. A LaSalle Street Tax (or Financial Transaction Tax) would raise billions of dollars in revenue for Illinois paid by those who can afford it, while slowing down their risky behavior.
Instead of Griffin or his company paying their fair share, Griffin recently spent $500 million of his massive fortune to purchase two paintings which are going on display at the Art Institute. The misguided billionaire is also helping fund Rauner's campaign to change Illinois voting maps that would weaken Black and Latino vote.
David Vitale, United Airlines, Willis Tower, 233 S. Wacker
While David Vitale was president of the Board of Ed, he was also paid hundreds of thousands per year to sit on the board of directors at United Airlines. CTU members and parents asked again and again for Vitale to join us in calling for TIF money to be returned to schools to avoid cuts and closings. Instead of advocating for the schools that he led, he closed them while profiting from a $30 million TIF deal and $10 million in city grants at United.
Vitale was also a chief architect of the toxic swap deals that cost CPS over $500 million in profits taken by big banks for predatory deals. Vitale refused to sue the banks or even ask if they would be willing to give up a dime-instead closing schools and laying off teachers to make the payments. Further, without an elected school board, Vitale was safe to put his banker friends, business reputation and personal financial interests ahead of the school district that he led.
This former Board of Education president is also helping fund Rauner's campaign to change Illinois voting maps that would weaken Black and Latino vote.
Board of Education, CPS, 42 W. Madison
Demonstrators will call for an Elected School Board and for CPS to end its relationships with banks and toxic swaps and fight for progressive revenue. Parents and educators may take a vote of "no confidence" in CEO Forrest Claypool who has no long-term fiscal strategy to strengthen CPS.
Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Chicago City Council, City Hall, 121 LaSalle
The CTU will join with citizens calling for an Elected Civilian Police Board in addition to its Elected Representative School Board. Educators will call on the mayor and the City Council to adopt progressive revenue options to fund public schools and to take a moral stand for the city's more than 300,000 public school students by fighting for revenue, ensuring safe and healthy school buildings, restoring special education cuts, and ending toxic deals and contracts that cripple working families.
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The Chicago Teachers Union represents nearly 27,000 teachers and educational support personnel working in the Chicago Public Schools, and by extension, the more than 400,000 students and families they serve. The CTU is an affiliate of the American Federation of Teachers and the Illinois Federation of Teachers and is the third largest teachers local in the United States and the largest local union in Illinois. For more information please visit CTU's website atwww.ctunet.com.
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There was also coverage from several corporate media outlets, some of which are below here:
CHICAGO TRIBUNE ARTICLE BELOW HERE:
Teachers union rallies for tax hike...Protests at City Hall include calls for elected police oversight board, By Juan Perez Jr., Grace Wong and Tyler Davis,Chicago Tribune
The Chicago Teachers Union and groups calling for an elected police oversight board teamed up to pack City Hall on Wednesday in a show of force aimed at pressuring Mayor Rahm Emanuel and aldermen for their respective causes.
The teachers union promoted its work as a call for city leaders to approve a series of local tax hikes, which it contends would avert the worst of the latest financial crisis besetting Chicago Public Schools and looming threats of a strike in the coming school year.
At the same time, the union employed its strategy of joining allied populist groups to reinforce its numbers.
“We want an elected school board and an elected police board,” CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey said into a megaphone outside City Council chambers. “There needs to be accountability at all levels to stop racism and defend the future of our children.”
Hours before the rallies were set to begin, CPS tried to get out front with an announcement it would challenge union efforts to discipline members who refused to participate in the union's April 1 work stoppage.
More than 1,000 protesters filled the main lobby at Chicago's City Hall on June 22, 2016. Substance photo by David R. Stone.The latest protest didn't rival that one, which saw thousands of demonstrators from several community groups flooding downtown streets to broadcast similar calls for an elected school board and dramatic changes to the way the city's police are supervised.
Still, the several hundred protesters on hand Wednesday pushed their way through City Hall's doors, carrying signs and chanting slogans outside council chambers as aldermen geared up for a heated monthly meeting. Others crammed part of a hallway on City Hall's first floor, where chants of “Banks got bailed out, schools got sold out” echoed.
Signs written in Spanish and English included: “City funding for a fair contract,” “Teachers and students have already sacrificed enough” and “The rich must pay their fair share.”
“We are terribly underfunded,” said Gayle Gibbons, who said she has taught in Chicago for 34 years. “We aren't getting the money we need from the state. The city is misspending funds that could go toward education.”
In the absence of action from Springfield, the CTU demands that Emanuel and aldermen approve a “revenue recovery package.” That would include a new tax on financial transactions, higher fuel and hotel taxes, plus a tax on ride-hailing services. Emanuel has taken a dim view of those proposals, however.
During Wednesday's meeting of the Chicago Board of Education, district CEO Forrest Claypool criticized both Republican Gov. Bruce Rauner and the teachers union.
“CTU leadership is asking instead that Chicago taxpayers make up for Gov. Rauner's failure to meet the state's constitutional obligation to fully and fairly fund our schools,” Claypool said. “A half-billion dollars in new taxes for Chicago taxpayers is not the answer.”
Rauner has noted Democrats had unfettered control of state government for a dozen years but failed to change the school funding formula.
Students, including those recent graduates in the National Honor Society, were part of the massive protest.CPS' planned “unfair labor practice” charge to the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board repeated district arguments that the union's one-day strike violated state law.
The district asserted the union “restrained and coerced” employees who did not participate in the action “by threatening to expose employees and hold them up to ridicule by their colleagues,” telling employees that they would have to forfeit their pay for April 1 and “denying them rights as members of the CTU.”
The union retorted that CPS' move was an effort to “thwart growing news coverage of today's Loop actions.”
Joining the CTU at the City Hall protest were members the Civilian Police Accountability Council, which wants an elected police oversight panel to replace the much-criticized Independent Police Review Authority.
Mark Clements, who was released from prison in 2009 after receiving four life sentences for a 1981 arson that killed four people when he was 16, said a lack of accountability has degraded the community's trust in law enforcement. “We're in 2016 and we're still operating as if we're still in bondage,” Clements said. “The mayor needs to appoint crime victims to any board. I'd be willing to sit on that board.”
Also targeted by the union were wealthy and influential Chicagoans, including Citadel hedge fund founder Ken Griffin, the state's richest man, who is an Emanuel ally and the frequent target of populist politicos.
“We're here because we are advocating for progressive income tax (and) the LaSalle Street tax,” said Tony Johnston, president of the Cook County College Teachers Union, while protesting outside Citadel's headquarters. Griffin, a major Rauner campaign donor, “is advocating for a ‘squeeze the beast' policy of public education,” Johnston said.
The union also demonstrated at River Point Plaza at Lake and Canal streets. That was aimed at Larry Levy, a restaurateur and developer. Yet another effort unfolded outside Willis Tower targeting David Vitale, the former Chicago Board of Education chairman who sits on the board of United Airlines, which is headquartered in the building.
“If there's one message that we want everyone to take away from this today, it's that we cannot have more cuts to our public schools,” said Sharkey, the union vice president. “They've been cut too much already. We're not talking about cutting fat. Now we're talking about cutting bone, muscle and sinew.”
By: George Cruz
City Hall
It's time city hall faces reality that there will be no real rescue from Springfield this year. After the election is a different story in 2017. The mayor needs to start laying the ground work for preparing to offer financial assistance to CPS. Already, according to a news article city hall has introduced an ordinance to lend money to its sister agency CPS. Afterall, city hall does have a $900 million dollar credit line and not too many people are aware that even CPS is also sitting on another $800 plus credit line as well. Not to mention increased property tax windfall coming in this August for CPS, which would reduce the overall budget deficit . All we need next is a dedicated pension tax and further cuts within the patronage bueracracy and CPS will be able to survive to next year.
But I can't see nor imagine the CTU signing off on any contract deal that doesn't provide a revenue stream to the school system and agree to revamping its flawed evaluation system , which by itself is strike worthy alone