Unity--We're Working Hard to Build Back Your Trust

Pay no attention to that man.

You know, I go to meetings, I read things, and I wonder what the hell our leadership is thinking. They write things, sometimes even under their real names, and I can’t make sense of it. How do they muster the audacity to write such things? Do they think we buy it? This is what it looks like to me.

Hi guys. It’s us, your pals from UFT Unity. We want you to know that we’re really, really trying to fix things. Now we know you’ve heard things from people. Some people are talking about us, and we understand you have questions. We want to clarify just a few things for you.

A lot of people are asking why we’ve done more in the last 4 months than we did in the last 15 years. Well, it has nothing to do with our stinging electoral losses last year. It’s a total coincidence, and anyone who disagrees is trying to break our union, and probably on the payroll of some anti-union group or something.

We’re working on class sizes.

Sure, it’s been six decades with no improvement. And sure, the city has no plans whatsoever to make enough space for this plan. There’s been a regulation in place for years that’s been ignored by all, including us. And of course there are a whole lot of schools that have been overcrowded for decades, and show no sign of changing any time soon.

The important thing, though, is that principals can now apply for extra funds if they have the space to accommodate more students. So some kids, in some places, will get smaller classes, some time or other. As for everyone else, they can hope for the best. And hope springeth eternal. What more are you gonna want? The important thing to remember is this—if this plan fails, it won’t be our fault.

We oppose scripted curriculum.

All that HMH and Illustrative Math stuff that’s making teachers nuts—we oppose it. Sure, it was piloted last year, and we did and said nothing. But now that everyone is up in arms about it, we’ve decided we don’t like it. So remember, if your principal says you need to read some crap line by line, even though it doesn’t work at all, we don’t support that. If you’re terrified to confront him, and neither will your chapter leader, if you even have one, just remember that we oppose it so it’s not our fault. We wrote a strongly worded letter, and that should be good enough for anyone!

We will never support Medicare Advantage for UFT retirees.

Sure, you’ll say, we supported it before, and sure, we pushed it for years. Sure, we accused you of spouting conspiracy theories and fairy tales. But now, even though we actively support the upcoming court cases trying to take away your Medicare, we support you.

This is important for you to know. We wrote it into a resolution, so go ahead and read it. Now sure, you’re still facing the Bentkowski case, where the mayor, with the full support of MLC, and us, your UFT bosses, want to give you no choice except the inferior Aetna plan.

But we promise, if you lose that case, to do something about it. Perhaps another strongly worded letter. And sure, we deny it’s a bad plan. Sure, we deny you’ll be denied coverage, even if Aetna admits it in court.

Sure you could die as a result of being in an MA plan. But lots of people die from other things. They get hit by cars. Pianos fall from tall buildings. They’re attacked by tigers. Why obsess over health care? Why not just take a walk and ignore all those troublesome naysayers?

Just remember, if NYC Retirees lose Bentkowski, and you get stuck with Aetna instead of real Medicare, it’s not our fault!

They want to bankrupt the Welfare Fund.

Those bastards in ABC have been nagging us about the 800 million bucks we’ve been sitting on. Who the hell do they think they are? They’re demanding improvements in the dental program. They’re demanding improvements in the optical program. They don’t understand the complexities we face in this modern world. We can’t afford that, and it’s irresponsible for them to even suggest it! They are totally unrealistic and unreasonable.

And by the way, we’ve improved the dental program. We’ve improved the optical program. It has absolutely nothing to do with their embarrassing revelations, and nothing to do with us losing two concurrent elections in landslide numbers. It also has nothing to do with the fact that we’re facing an election months from now.

Anyone who disagrees wants to bankrupt the Welfare Fund.

We’re paying UFT delegates. Well, SOME of them anyway.

Now don’t get the wrong idea. We’re sending a $250 stipend to each DA delegate to show we appreciate their work. After all, it’s the least we can do. No, we’re not trying to buy anyone off. We would never do such a thing. What the hell kind of desperate act would that be?

But so far, we’re not sending checks to retiree DA delegates. No, it has nothing to do with the fact they defeated us. No, it has nothing to do with the fact that they vote against us, or pass uppity resolutions that make it harder for us to pretend to support their health care fight. And sure, they’ll say it’s ageism again, just because we celebrated and applauded the ageism of our members. But that’s just petty. You know how old people can get.

The actual reason we didn’t pay retiree delegates is because it would be irresponsible to utilize union funds in that way. And anyone who says differently wants to bankrupt the Welfare Fund. Or COPE. (Or whatever the hell it is that money comes from.) Plus they’d probably just donate it all to NYC Retirees.*

We’re paying valuable lip service to increasing para pay.

Now we aren’t doing this because the paras voted three to one against us. And thank goodness they didn’t run a larger slate, or we wouldn’t have total control over the para chapter. It’s just a coincidence that we happen to be coming around at this time. Now we hear what paras are saying. They’re saying that a one-time payout of $3,000 is not the same as an actual raise.

But here’s the thing—because paras get paid so little, $3,000 to them is a lot more. So even though teachers and counselors, who get paid a hell of a lot more than paras, also got $3,000, it felt like more to paraprofessionals. Sure we had 450 million dollars to play with, and we could have devoted it to a long-term para raise, but hey, didn’t that 3K feel like a lot? Plus, how could we have sold another sub-inflationary contract without a sweetener?

Also, after decades of little or no support, we’re now giving para reps a stipend of 200 bucks, and hoping that will make them support us! You know, maybe if we buy their votes, we can get them to persuade others we haven’t neglected them all these decades. Now some people are saying if we couldn’t buy paras for $3000, we won’t be able to buy them for 200. There’s some logic to that, but Mulgrew says there isn’t, so that’s that, and again, it’s not our fault. And of course we are not trying to buy votes.

And hey, next time, if you vote us in, you can have absolute confidence we will continue to talk about para pay. Jeez, we held a frigging press conference about the para shortage. Who needs money when you have that?

After two decades of being out of compliance, we’re working to fix special education.

Are you one of those special education teachers with tons of complaints? Are you afraid to file one because your administration is batshit crazy? Well, we know how you feel.

We all work for Michael Mulgrew, and he’s an absolute frigging despot. Speak ill of him, look at him the wrong way and you’ll be sharpening pencils with Amy Arundell. We know how that is. You don’t trust the union to protect you. We don’t trust it to protect us either. So we feel your pain! Just like you need to protect your jobs, we need to protect our second pensions.

Are you an OT/PT, upset because we offered you an additional period for extra money, instead of the parity you voted for? We understand just how you feel. Well, not exactly, because most of us are teachers and get paid way more than you do. But, you know, we have to work additional time to earn extra money and second pensions.

To serve retirees better, we’re raising your pharmacy premiums.

If you’re retired, you no longer get prescriptions from our Welfare Fund, which is the bestest Welfare Fund in the galaxy. Instead of paying from 10-30 bucks per prescription, you pay 25% of the actual cost. Now sure, you might be paying $300 a month for some generic, but hey, it beats paying the whole 1200!

For this privilege, we charge you $120 a month. Of course, we’re raising it by 25%, to 150 a month. So that’s one fourth better, isn’t it? You know, prices go up. Of course your pension hardly ever does, but the price hike means your pharmacy program is now 25% better than your pension! No need to thank us. We’re always out there battling to make things better for you! And remember, we absolutely oppose premiums! Except for your pharmacy plan. Or whatever happens later, which will absolutely not be our fault.

Because we love retirees, for the first time ever, we’re imposing co-pays.

How can you trust your doctor is doing a good job if you aren’t paying? Everyone knows that money is a great motivator. And if Medicare and Emblem pay your doctor 100%, how will the doctor know you care? Once you pull that money out of your pocket, your doctor will know you really care. That’s the only way you know you’re getting the real stuff, instead of some placebo.

Now there are those naysayers from A Better Contract, and they’ll say we just imposed the co-pays to make Aetna Medicare Advantage look relatively less crappy. As we said, we still think Aetna MA is the bestest thing since the birth control pill. Michael Mulgrew says doctors will take it and no one will be hurt by the denials, so we say so too. While Aetna said otherwise in court, we deny denials will occur. If they do, it will absolutely not be our fault, because we opposed it even after having created and enabled it.

And remember, if you just don’t get sick, you’ll still have no co-pays!

Thanks to Daniel A. for graphic.

*If they ever send me a stipend, it’s going straight to NYC Retirees. Donate here.