Union extortion

UFT won't sign new teacher evaluation agreement without wage increase guarantee, city officials claim

By  YOAV GONEN, Education Reporter

The teachers’ union has refused to sign a long-awaited agreement with the city on a new teacher evaluation system unless it gets a guarantee of wage increases in the next contract, Department of Education officials charged today.

They claim the union also sought to derail talks on the rating system, which started in April, by mandating that the city confirm how many schools it will close next year first, according to a complaint filed by the DOE.

uft

In a letter to the state Public Employee Relations Board, DOE officials said the union recently refused to negotiate details of the evaluations at all until questions of how it would be implemented were answered first — which they claim violates state bargaining law.

Following an email by UFT President Michael Mulgrew outlining that “ultimatum,” the union canceled meetings on December 18 and 19, the DOE claims.

The agency has until Jan. 17 to get its evaluation system approved by the State Education Department or else it will forfeit $250 million in state education aid.

“We remain prepared to negotiate all outstanding issues required to get to an agreement on teacher evaluation, but, unfortunately, Mr. Mulgrew’s failure to bargain in good faith and insistence on including issues unrelated to teacher evaluation is unacceptable and illegal,” Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott said in a statement.

Mulgrew said his union has been waiting since last week for the DOE to schedule a meeting on the roll-out and implementation of the evaluations, which he insisted is fair game in the bargaining talks.

In its filing today, the DOE called it putting the cart before the horse.

“The idea that this is not a subject of bargaining is ludicrous,” Mulgrew told The Post. “I’m sitting in downtown Manhattan, my phone’s not ringing and it’s up to them to set up the meeting.”

He said he’s prioritizing talks on the roll-out of the system because the DOE had already botched initial preparations, such as by not providing the proper training.

Asked whether his union was seeking promises of future wage increases in the current talks, Mulgrew declined to say.

“I’m not negotiating in public,” he said.

The most recent teachers’ union contract expired in October 2009, although its terms have remained in effect ever since.

Talks on a subsequent contract stalled largely because the city said it couldn’t match the pattern of raises given to other public employees — of 4 percent annually — after the economy soured in 2009.