State Council makes preparations for effort to defend public education

By Trudy Stephenson Willis

At the January meeting, CTA's State Council of Education laid the groundwork for a counteroffensive against the governor and his big-business allies in response to their carefully orchestrated assault on public education.

The governor has introduced a package of legislation as well as similarly worded ballot initiatives to be taken to the voters in the event the Legislature doesn't bow to pressure. Among other things, the measures would undermine funding for public education and attempt to silence its chief defenders, CTA and other employee unions.

The governor has "turned his back on the students and teachers of this state," said CTA President Barbara E. Kerr in her address to Council. She accused him of reneging on the budget agreement he made with CTA and the entire Education Coalition last year. Under the agreement that was signed into law, public schools gave up $2 billion to help balance the budget with the promise that the money would be repaid when state revenues increased.

"State revenues increased, but the governor told our six million students and 335,000 educators 'Tough luck,'" said Kerr. The $2.3 billion in cuts he proposes come on top of $8.9 billion dollars in cuts the schools have suffered over the past four years.

Her advice to teachers and school employees is: "Don't agonize. Organize!"

CTA has to do more than fight back, she said. It has to put the big-business, anti-public education forces on the defensive. Plans to do just that are being developed. Meanwhile, CTA and the Education Coalition have launched a series ofradio spots, conducted polls, and held focus groups to gather input from members and staff.

The governor's agenda has multiple fronts. It would privatize the retirement systems for teachers and other public employees, establish merit pay, eliminate seniority, emasculate collective bargaining agreements and cripple public employee unions. But what's most upsetting is the attack on school funding.

In addition to not giving education its share of increased revenues under the Proposition 98 minimum funding guarantee this year, the governor has proposed eliminating the Maintenance Factor (Test 3), which would permanently cut $15,000 from every classroom.

"Prop. 98 is a promise that we, the grown-ups of the state of California, have made to the children," said newly elected Speaker of the Assembly Fabian Nunez, who stopped by State Council to show his support for teachers. "It's a promise that we are going to do better for our children than our own parents were able to do for us."

He accused the governor of talking out of both sides of his mouth. "How can you negotiate with someone when you can't trust that they will honor their agreement? Does every conversation have to be transcribed, notarized and videotaped?"

Among all the revolutionary things CTA has accomplished in its history, none is more radical than the passage of Prop. 98 in 1988, said CTA Executive Director Carolyn Doggett. "It is the only provision in the constitution of any state that guarantees K-14 public education a certain amount of the state budget."

The voters of California approved Prop. 98 because they believe schools deserve to be funded.

"I don't care if he was Mr. Universe," said Doggett, "there's no way Gov. Schwarzenegger can out-muscle the 335,000 members of CTA and our more than 500 dedicated staff. Together, we can meet any challenge — and I know we are up to the task."

Council took positions on several pieces of the governor's legislative package, many of which are already under consideration in special session:

• Delegates voted to oppose a special session measure [SCAX1 1 (Runner)] that would establish merit pay for school employees, bar the consideration of seniority in employment decisions, override collective bargaining agreements and prohibit "tenure" from being granted to any employee who has not had satisfactory annual assessments for the previous 10 years.

  "All teachers merit good pay!" said Kerr. "If pay is based solely on test scores, you are never going to get a teacher to teach in our schools of greatest need."

• Delegates were unanimous in their opposition to two bills [ACA 5 and ACAX1 1 (Richman)] that would change the State Teachers Retirement System (STRS) and the Public Employee Retirement System (PERS) from a defined benefit plan offering a fixed pension to defined contribution plan in which employees hired after July 1, 2007, would invest their own retirement money with no guarantee of return. (Current employees would be affected if they changed districts before they were vested.)

• Delegates decided to actively oppose a constitutional amendment [ACAX1 4 (Keene) and ACA 5 (Richman)] that would eliminate the responsibility of the state to reimburse schools for money owed them under Test 3 in the Prop. 98 guarantee. The proposal calls for repaying prior debts to schools over a period of up to 15 years, but not applying the money to the Prop. 98 base. It would also allow for across-the-board cuts in years when state expenditures exceed revenues and in the event the state budget is not enacted on time.

Council also took advisory positions on more than 50 initiatives that have been filed for possible circulation so that CTA can respond quickly between Council sessions if necessary. It also authorized the use of its war chest — the CTA Initiative Fund — to mount a counteroffensive.

Following Kerr's advice — "Don't agonize. Organize!" — delegates swarmed around a booth containing petitions they could sign to demand that the governor fully fund public schools as voters intended when they passed Prop. 98.

They were quick to point out that the governor's legislative package does nothing to deal with the problems of underfunding that public education faces.