CTU NEWS: Debate becomes more heated as CTU leadership continues to cover up use of money from PAC and the 'CTU Foundation'...
Now that the 26,000 - member Chicago Teachers Union has agreed to a four-year contract which (as I've reported earlier) is the worst in the 50 year history of CTU collective bargaining, a new and equally fierce debate has broken out within the union's ranks over why the union leadership continues to cover up how the union members' dollars are being spent in political action, on the one hand, and through the newly created "CTU Foundation," on the other. In both cases, the union's current leadership, which first took office under the banner of the Caucus Of Rank-and-file Educators (CORE) on July 1, 2010, has refused to provide the union's 800-member House of Delegates (HOD) with regular reports on how these union funds are spent, or to honor procedures requiring that certain expenditures be approved by the HOD prior to the checks being cut.
While challenges to come of the CTU's activities have taken place in the past, the current debates are in a way unprecedented. First, because CORE took over the leadership of the union after a hotly contested election (and runoff) in May and June 2010 promising full "transparency." Second, because the creation of the "CTU Foundation" under the complete control of the union's four elected officers is unprecedented, resulting from the liquidation of one of the most valuable assets the union held for more than a half century -- the Fewkes Tower.
While the two issues are separate, they both apparently have roots in the same source: the refusal of the current leaders, despite promises of so-called "transparency", to actually provide the union's delegates and members with regular reports (and when necessary, consultation and approval) about how the union's dollar are spent.
