Finally, There's Going To Be A WTU Election !

[Hannah Bell]

(Background: Weingarten & her man in DC George Parker pulled some jiggerty-pokerty to stop a DC teachers' union election because they were afraid an anti-Parker/Weingarten guy would get in, upsetting various ongoing applecarts...)


Although long overdue, members of the Washington Teachers' Union will finally have an election of officers. According to the WTU Constitution, union elections were supposed to be conducted in May with officers being installed in office on July 1, 2010.

This has been a long protracted battle which began with AFT becoming involved in taking over the elections of the 15 member WTU Elections Committee in June 2010 because members had not been properly elected. Once elected, the elections committee members requested George Parker, WTU President (whose term ended June 30, 2010) to provide the necessary paperwork so that they could commence elections, Parker refused.

Despite repeated appeals by elections chairperson, Claudette Carson to Parker requesting that he cooperate with elections committee members to move forward with a timely election, Parker dug his heels in the sand. What followed next was Parker convening a June 9 and June 15 Executive Board meeting and appointing four new board members illegally....Parker with his newly appointed board in tow took the following measures of setting a new election schedule for the fall of 2010 stating that it was the executive's board's role to determine the elections schedule.

What followed after Parker's election meddling were his retaliatory actions to reduce Nathan Saunders, WTU General VP's salary to a big fat zero while Parker continued to earn a hefty sum of our union dues in the amount of $150,000 and perks. Next, Parker also refused to sign Saunders DCPS leave of absence. Parker's actions left Saunders working for free and would have forced him back into the classroom at the beginning of school even though he was elected to office by the membership...Suddenly but not surprising, the AFT became interested in 'talking resolutions' after the lawyers became involved...

http://thewashingtonteacher.blogspot.com/


Vote Saunders/Peterson slate for WTU '2010