New York City Union Officials Fiddle While Their Members Must Be Burning
Another example of union bosses’ contempt for their rank and file: Many teachers depend upon their union officials to negotiate on their behalf, and are left high and dry while union officials party and live a life of luxury. Carl Campanile and Yoav Gonen have the story in the New York Post:
While city public-school teachers have gone without a new contract or regular pay raises for three straight years, their union, its staffers and political cronies have been living large off their union dues, a Post review found.
Included in the United Federation of Teachers’ $166.5 million in spending last year was a hefty $33.4 million in salary for union staffers — a slight increase from the year prior.
More than 90 staffers earned six-figure salaries between July 2011 and June 2012, the records show — including President Michael Mulgrew, who took home $275,000.
UFT President Michael Mulgrew pulled down $275,000 running the $166 million teachers union.
The union also spent more than $1 million for one company, Lackmann Culinary Services, to cater food for its various meetings and events.
The union also spent more than $1 million for one company, Lackmann Culinary Services, to cater food for its various meetings and events.
“We are proud of the work we do advocating on behalf of the children and teachers of New York City,” Mulgrew responded when asked about the largesse. “It takes a lot of money to resist the attempts of Mayor Bloomberg and his allies to undermine our public schools.”
The UFT’s political allies — mostly opponents of charter schools and of school choice in general — were also particularly well-fed in 2012, records show.
The group that succeeded ACORN, New York Communities for Change, has become virtually a subsidiary of the UFT — receiving nearly $400,000 for at least the second straight year.
Among the services it performed was the organizing of parents to oppose charter-school siting within public school buildings.
The former head of ACORN, Bertha Lewis, even got $17,500 for the new group she’s heading — the Black Institute.