The Responsible Opposition

The oxymoron at work.

Let’s define our terms, first. Opposition doesn’t mean whatever it is, I’m against it. I consider myself opposition to Unity Caucus (and from what I hear, they seem to agree). But there are many times I vote for things they propose. A whole lot of what comes up at the Delegate Assembly is Mom and Apple Pie. I don’t vote no, for example, when we commemorate our union, or when we support education or labor elsewhere.

However, there are places I draw the line. For example, I no longer trust Unity to protect our health. If we aren’t allowed to see actual contracts, I can’t support them anymore. I favored the 2014 contract, and it contained a poison pill called Appendix B that enabled Medicare Advantage for UFT Retirees. I should have known better then, but I sure do now.

Do you want me to support a contract? Then let me frigging SEE it first.

Wouldn’t you teach your children and students that? Wouldn’t it be particularly germane when you know the person presenting it has lied to you before? Isn’t that common sense? (In Spanish, they say common sense is the least common of all the senses.)

Randi Weingarten once called the New Action Caucus (NAC) the “responsible opposition.” Norm Scott wrote about it way back in 2006, and you can see me commenting on it, under my old nom de plume, NYC Educator. Weingarten, evidently, thought a responsible opposition was one that didn’t oppose her re-election.

This hasn’t changed, of course. Unity is good with opposition as long as they don’t, you know, oppose. I don’t speak for NAC, of course, but I will tell you that Retiree Advocate is a direct offshoot of it, and that key members of the RA 12, the ones who presume to decide for the 300 of us who ran with them, are or have been directly involved with NAC for years.

The most prominent member of Retiree Advocate is RTC Chapter Leader Bennett Fischer. Bennett was one of the 12 who saw fit to align with the ARISE coalition last election season. He didn’t deem it important to give the other 288 of us voice or vote in where we were going. (After all, what did we do for Retiree Advocate, other than help them run and win?)

In any case, there are five Retiree Advocate members on the UFT health committee, the one Unity set up to give itself cover when they failed to consult us. All but Bennett Fisher showed up, and all who showed up voted to send it to the rubber-stamp Delegate Assembly.

And what did RA do to enable this? They took a petition that asked rank and file to approve health contracts, and modified it to send them to the DA instead. This, effectively, means rank and file will not get to decide on this health plan.

Does that make RA “responsible opposition?” Is it the responsibility of opposition to support whatever Unity demands? I’d argue otherwise. It’s the responsibility of opposition to demand clarity and transparency. RA reps failed to do that. Unity may label that responsible, but I’d call it an abrogation of responsibility. We elected RA to stand up to Unity.

Many or most of us teachers. Our job largely entails setting examples. Signing contracts we’ve neither seen, nor had checked out by independent parties, is irresponsible. I wouldn’t buy a used car unless I had an independent mechanic check it out. (And I don’t know about you, but my health is a lot more important to me than my car.)

Unity will tell you this plan is our “only choice.” That’s another oxymoron. If it’s the only thing we can do, that means we have no choice whatsoever. They use, as they have in the past, an appeal to fear to sell this. If we don’t accept this plan, they contend, the one they’re not allowing us to see, you’ll have premiums, and another plan that no one has agreed upon at all.

Unity adores appeals to fear. They had a great one back when they were trying to rewrite 12-126 so the city wouldn’t have to support Medicare for retirees. I wrote about it at the time. Mulgrew emailed in-service members in October 2022 and had this to say:

The city’s Office of Labor Relations sent a letter to the head of the Municipal Labor Committee giving the unions notice of its intent to enroll all Medicare‑eligible city retirees in a NYC Medicare Advantage plan and eliminate all other retiree health plans, including GHI SeniorCare. If the unions don’t go along with it, the city has threatened annual health care premiums of roughly $1,500 for all in‑service municipal employees

That’s kind of remarkable. If we didn’t sell out the retirees, Unity threatened, we’d have to pay 1500 bucks a year. This is a union leader openly pitting one faction of the union against another. This is, therefore, a union leader who doesn’t seem to know the meaning of the word union.

You probably know that we were able to block Unity’s attempt to change that law, and you probably know that no such premium was placed in effect either.

Last year, we voted for a change. We voted for the voice we were denied in Unity’s preposterous Retired Teacher Chapter, the one that allowed questions when it felt like it, and voting not at all. We voted for someone who would stand up to Mulgrew and his thriving patronage mill.

What we got, though, has been disappointing. We have a chapter leader who not only failed to demand transparency with a new health plan, but further failed to even show up and vote on it. And rather than demand Unity show its cards, he’s writing Unity-approved columns propagating false insinuations about ABC and NYC Retirees.

On Facebook, Bennett’s column is posted on the official UFT Retiree Page. You won’t see this column there, since Retiree Advocate cannily negotiated that no personal Substack pages would be permitted there. One commenter complained that RA had failed to act to promote 1096, and that’s absolutely true. She was met with great anger by Leo Casey, who commenced yet another diatribe against Marianne Pizzitola, and offered a Substack link in which he suggested she was racist.

I’ve known Marianne for a few years now. She hasn’t got a racist bone in her body.

Still, the commenter had a point. RA blocked my efforts to promote an amicus brief in Bentkowski, which we lost. Would our voice have made a difference? We’ll never know. RA failed to follow up on supporting our 1096 resolution, even though I came to RTC Executive Board with a plan to do so. And make no mistake, Leo Casey and all his Unity BFFs OPPOSE 1096, despite the fact we voted overwhelmingly to support it.

Bennett makes a statement suggesting that Medicare Advantage has been conclusively defeated, but Bentkowski says otherwise. It could pop up its ugly head at any time. It’s disappointing to see him accepting the Unity talking point that it’s dead and gone, even as they fight tooth and nail against NYC Retiree efforts to enshrine it in law.

Bennett further suggests the defeat of MA, be it temporary or permanent, is due to our efforts. Bennett can take credit for whatever he likes, but credit is not due him. It’s not primarily due to us either. It’s due to Marianne Pizzitola and NYC Retirees. who went to court, did the work, and who show up on the streets when necessary.

Just in case it’s not abundantly clear, credit is certainly not due to Unity Caucus. Unity fought tooth and nail for not one, but two MA plans. Their Great Leader, Michael Mulgrew, said those of us who opposed it were spouting fairy tales and conspiracy theories. He suggested we were enemies of the union, and folded only after his humiliating RTC loss.

Casey suggests that Pizzitola is aligned with MAGA. This is interesting to me. A few years back, when we were first hearing about her, a Unity member suggested to me that she was aligned with Trump, and that I therefore should ignore her. Later, during the RTC election, Unity put out some photo aligning her with MORE and some Palestinian group or DSA or something, implying she was far left somehow. Now Unity endorses a DSA member, and are painting Marianne as MAGA once again. They’ve come full circle, and are consistent only in their hypocrisy.

Marianne’s group saved our health care. Were it not for them, we’d all be in MA right now. Unity should just admit they hate her for doing the job they failed to do, rather than attack her out of sour grapes.

Here’s what I know—Marianne runs a group that promotes health care for seniors. They have a particular demands of candidates who want her support, and if candidates meet them, the group says so. Casey calls that “kissing the ring,” but when Unity demands mayoral candidates spend a day fake-teaching in public schools, that’s no issue whatsoever.

Here’s another thing I know—the issue Bennett harps on, that no one in ABC, or NYC Retirees is taking a position against GOP plans to add prior authorizations to Medicare, is absolutely without merit. I am in regular touch not only with ABC retirees, but also with Marianne. I spoke to her just today. Both she and her group oppose pre-authorizations, no matter who suggests them. Every ABC retiree with whom I’ve met agrees.

Here’s another thing we all agree on—we need an opposition that will stand up to Unity rather than get into bed with them. If that means we aren’t a “responsible” opposition, too bad.

We’ve defended ourselves before, and we’ll do it again, whatever it takes.