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THE PATRIOT RETURNS |
Vol. 47, No.1 April 12, 2009
The Campaign at City Tech:
As you are probably aware, the election is underway for the leadership of the Professional Staff Congress, which represents faculty, CLT's and HEO's across CUNY. A colleague pointed out to me that some of our newer faculty might not be aware of the history of the situation, or may be too busy with work to pay close attention, so I thought I'd send this email out to a few of my friends on the City Tech campus. It's my view that the job of any union is simply to get the best possible contract and benefits for its members. The "New" Caucus is not new--it has been in power now for nine years and they seem to have their priorities backwards. They are all about street demonstrations for political issues irrelevant to the one and only cause we pay them for: a good contract. For example, when the university has faced budget cuts, they've demonstrated in front of 80th Street, among other places. But City Hall and Albany control the sources of CUNY's funding, not Chancellor Goldstein. He, like CUNY's dedicated faculty and staff, most certainly has the best interests of our students at heart. I've never met the man, but I have a hard time believing that he is the two-dimensional caricature portrayed by our current union leadership. And this pointless action simply embarrassed our faculty and irritated the Chancellor. We went for years without any contract at all, while our existing union leadership was out demonstrating with the transit workers. Back in 2006, that situation led me to write a letter to President Bowen comparing her ineffective leadership to the very effective leadership of the stagehands' union, of which I'm also a member. She never responded, so I sent it to "The Patriot Returns", who published it. What I wrote then is still relevant today, and you can read it here. The publication of this letter led to me running with the CUNY Alliance against the existing leadership, which led to me having to battle our local union leadership here on campus, as they engaged in Karl Rove-like tactics instead of fighting on the issues (the existing leadership generally seems to react this way to any challenge). Coming out of no where, and with little organizational infrastructure in place, the CUNY Alliance got like 46% of the vote. We didn't win, and the existing leadership delivered yet another pathetic contract, which required us give to back $30,000,000 of retroactive pay due to us (between $1,000 to $2,000 for a typical member) to cover their mismanagement of our welfare fund. Our existing contract ends next year, and if the New (Old) Caucus is re-elected, I'm confident we will have more of the same: diminished benefits, poor member service, and contract after contract with raises that don't even match the inflation rate. I didn't run with the CUNY Alliance this time (just too busy) but I'm putting my ballot in the mail today supporting the CUNY Alliance 100%, and I hope you will too!
Sharad Karkhanis, Ph.D.
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