Forum: Proud of the CTU
June 14, 2012 7:28PM
Updated: July 16, 2012 6:36AM
As a retired yet active member of the Chicago Teachers Union, I am so proud to be a part of its judgment and efforts on behalf of teachers as well as students. That nearly 90 percent of members voted to strike if contract negotiations in August do not go well is a show of solidarity and a message that teachers will not sit passively while the school board’s mandates are enacted as if teachers are puppets.
If uncontested, the Chicago Public Schools’ policies will lead to larger class sizes; fewer teachers, paraprofessionals and clinicians; unsafe facilities, more standardized testing, more charter schools and longer school days without the needed, additional resources.
It is hard to think of a potential strike given the economic hard times. But in the same spirit that I and others struck for 19 days in the 1980s for fair treatment of students and teachers alike, I have to give CTU president Karen Lewis and her members credit for standing up to the mayor, the CPS chief executive and the general public, most of whom have never spent a single day at the head of a classroom.
Marie E. Roman
Tinley Park
They need the money ASAP
I don’t know why I was surprised to learn that for the first time in more than 30 years, the second-installment property tax bills would be due on time this year in Cook County. The taxing districts need the money!
For the last several years, people in the United States have grown accustomed to endless increases in the cost of everything. The solution for governments, insurance companies, oil companies and on and on and on is simply to force people to pay more.
Employers can’t possibly compensate employees at an increase comparable to the rising demands on their paychecks, and I think many employers stopped trying years ago. They continue to close offices, reduce benefits and reduce payroll. Salary increases for those who remain are negligible, if they happen at all.
Believing that the solution to the mess we’re in is to continue to increase costs and burden employees and taxpayers is just plain wrong. It’s increasing the financial stress on about 99 percent of the country, and that has to stop.
Mike Beno
Flossmoor
Voters can only do so much
R.C. from Oak Lawn wants to know what’s wrong with the people of Illinois when they keep putting the same politicians back in office time after time.
The problem is that too many people in this state have been subjugated by the Democratic Party and are addicted to the government breast.
When the government funding runs low, these elected thieves simply go back to the chumps who pay taxes and raise fees and taxes.
The people who vote are overwhelming those who work for a living. Wake up, Illinois. In an increasingly one-party state, it’s difficult to vote these career politicians out.
Roger Busch
Chicago
