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Portland, Oregon Teachers Vote to Strike!

Yesterday we mentioned the possibility of Portland Oregon’s teachers going on strike. Late last night the PAT‘s rank and file overwhelmingly authorized a strike.

Via Reuters…

Teachers in Portland, Oregon’s largest school district, voted Wednesday night to authorize a strike, setting the stage for a walkout that could disrupt classes for nearly 48,000 students, union officials said.

Portland’s 2,828 teachers have been engaged for months in contentious off-and-on negotiations with the district on a new three-year contract, and the strike authorization vote clears the way for a strike on February 20 if no settlement is reached, the Portland Association of Teachers said late Wednesday.

“No teacher ever wants to go on strike, we want to be in classrooms with our students,” union president Gwen Sullivan said in a statement after the vote.

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“We can still negotiate after a strike vote,” Miles said. “We are still at the table. We are still trying to come to an agreement.”

A strike authorization does not necessarily mean that the teachers will walk out. It does, however, allow union leaders to declare a strike if negotiations are not successful.

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The district already is bracing for a possible walkout with plans to keep its 78 schools open using substitute teachers if the need arises.

Some parents, however, have expressed concern at the prospect of their children crossing picket lines to attend classes or extracurricular activities during a strike.

“I don’t think we would send them to school with substitutes. We support the teachers,” said Ali King, the mother of two daughters in the sixth and ninth grades. “Even with qualified subs, it will be a disruptive atmosphere.”

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Students at several Portland high schools were planning to stage their own rallies to show support for teachers before the vote on Wednesday.

The union and school district have been at odds over class size, teacher workloads, wages and insurance coverage, but the issue of staffing levels has emerged as the chief stumbling block.

The @PATSolidarity Twitter account reported…

Somewhere upwards of 97% of teachers voted to strike, about 2700 of 2900 attended. #patstrike #1u #pdx #teachers #resolved

— PAT Solidarity (@PATSolidarity) February 6, 2014

Our brothers and sisters in the PAT, and NEA local, have moved to the front lines in the battle for quality public education. We will monitor this situation very closely and the PJSTA will support them in any way we can as we stand in solidarity with them.

Largest LIRR Union Votes Unanimously to Strike

We first mentioned this possibility yesterday. Last night one of the LIRR’s unions voted unanimously to strike.

Via the Daily News…

Members of the Long Island Rail Road’s largest union voted 500 to 0 on Wednesday to strike, a development that helps lay the groundwork for a walkout as soon as March.

Two locals that make up the Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Union voted in Massapequa, L.I. The third local in the union didn’t participate.

“The membership spoke loud and clear tonight … and said we will not sit back and be disrespected,” said Anthony Simon, SMART’s general chairman. “I have never been prouder to be their leader.”

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About 6,000 LIRR workers have labored without a contract for more than three years, and talks aimed at producing a new contract have reached an impasse. Workers are angry that officials at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority — the LIRR’s parent company — won’t adopt a contract settlement proposed by a Presidential Emergency Board. It includes modest raises, but MTA bosses shot it down last month.

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The emergency board, made up of neutral mediators, delivered its recommendations in December after hearing labor and management experts testify about MTA finances and various additional factors. The board concluded the MTA could afford to pay the raises it proposed — amounting to about 2.85% a year for six years — without raising fares in 2015 higher than the 4% jump already planned. It also said workers should start contributing 2% of their base pay for health care.

But the MTA is pushing for a three-year wage freeze for all of its workers unless pay increases are offset by cost savings related to productivity. The mediators didn’t endorse the work-rule changes the MTA sought to balance out potential rises for LIRR workers.

We will continue to follow this story as it unfolds in the coming month.

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Posted on February 5, 2014 by thepjsta

Two Strike Votes Tonight

Tonight there will be two strike votes taking place. One of the votes will feature a teachers union while the other features a Long Island union.

This evening at 7:00 pm Pacific time teachers in Portland, Oregon will be voting on whether or not to authorize a strike. The Portland Association of Teachers, an NEA local, is made up of nearly 3,000 teachers plus more than 1,000 substitute teachers. Today, in solidarity with their teachers, students held walkouts around the city of Portland. As the story unfolds we will have more here at thepjsta.org. You can follow @PATSolidarity on Twitter to keep track of the story in real time. The PJSTA is proud to stand in solidarity with our brothers and sisters in Portland!

The other strike vote taking place tonight is that of the LIRR’s largest union. Via Newsday...

The Sheet Metal, Air and Transportation Union/United Transportation Union, which represents nearly half of LIRR laborers, will cast their ballots at back-to-back meetings in Massapequa Wednesday night. SMART UTU general chairman Anthony Simon, who expects a unanimous “yes” vote from members, said he will also be handing out picket signs and coordinating strike captains.

Smaller LIRR unions have already approved similar votes to walk off the job as early as March 21. Simon said his union’s vote — the first of its kind in two decades — is “the toughest for our members ever to make.”

“This is going to affect their finances, their families, and the Long Island economy,” Simon said. “But they are standing united with their union, because they have been pushed around far too long.”

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In November, President Barack Obama appointed a Presidential Emergency Board to help resolve the dispute. After listening to arguments from labor and management during a weeklong Manhattan hearing, the board largely ruled in the unions’ favor, saying that the MTA could afford to give workers raises without having to raise fares. The unions accepted the board’s nonbinding recommendations, but the MTA rejected them.

The PJSTA proudly stands in solidarity with all of their brothers and sisters in the labor movement. We will have more on these situations as they unfold.