The UFT RTC Sets a New Tone, Adopts a New Motion

Yesterday the United Federation of Teachers Retired Teachers Chapter held its first meeting with new leadership

Last June, when Retiree Advocate (RA) defeated Unity 17,227 to 10,115, both sides knew that this was a major change, and that it would have consequences. On July 1, 2024, Bennett Fischer became the first non-Unity chapter leader of the UFT’s Retired Teachers Chapter (RTC), and twenty-four more of us (including me) became officers and executive board members of the chapter.

At the same time, three hundred of us became delegates to the UFT Delegate Assembly. I’ll write about delegates, but not today. The Delegate Assembly is a decision making body. The Retired Teachers Chapter meeting, is well…

The Largest Chapter in the United Federation of Teachers

So the RA Exec Board and officers have been in place since July 1. But the RTC does not hold its first meeting until October. And all of us wondered what that would look like. We (Exec Board) did a lot of planning.

So we got to the day of. Tuesday October 22, 2024. We had an agenda. We had assignments. We had not practiced. We had some slides. We had a resolution. We had guest speakers.

We opened with the New York City Labor Chorus. It set a nice tone. Bennett reported - adjusted timing because Michael Mulgrew was not present. We introduced changes; we introduced things that were staying the same. New Health Care Committee. Labor Solidarity Committee. A big focus was political action in the run up to the presidential election. I spoke about Facebook (and answered a question about me being thrown off the previous page - just a few days ago with “This will be a brand new happy page and this is a happy talk” - and walked away from the mike. )

We had decided to invite Marianne Pizzitola and Jake Gardener to speak and answer questions about the law suit. Marianne introduced and Jake spoke - and stayed on the topic of the lawsuits. The question and answer got testy at points - the opposition (former leadership, Unity) tried to ask hard questions. Bennett moderated well - and with perhaps one exception, the exchanges were respectful. In some instances they felt like a model of remaining reasonable while disagreeing. People noticed the…

New Tone

No one got shut down. Questions got answered - even if we still disagreed. Bennett was clearly even-handed. And I started to notice some response from the crowd. Did I say crowd? The hall was good for 400, the actual maximum was near 350, by the end we were just under 300. And on line… definitely over 2000, although you’ll see the votes, at the end, were around 1400. But back to tone - full room - and at a couple of points there was some heckling - but Bennett set a better tone, and, unevenly, the crowd on both sides settled back down. And I saw people, retirees on both sides of the issue, respond positively, and contribute - this new tone is important. No one is being told they cannot disagree - but we will do so respectfully. And if you think the Q & A with Marianne was challenging in that respect, remember, the RTC Executive Board prepared a…

Resolution

Motion from the Retired Teachers Chapter Executive Board to approve the following resolution for submission to the UFT Delegate Assembly:

No changes to UFT members’ healthcare without Delegate Assembly approval

WHEREAS the United Federation of Teachers bargains over healthcare on behalf of its members, both directly, and indirectly through its participation in the Municipal Labor Committee; and

WHEREAS, healthcare is among the most important benefits for both in-service and retiree UFT members; and 

WHEREAS the UFT Delegate Assembly is the highest decision-making body of the UFT, and

WHEREAS at times significant changes to healthcare have been approved without approval of the UFT Delegate Assembly, or without the Delegate Assembly having details of the proposed change, or without the Delegate Assembly having reasonable time to read, discuss, and question proposed changes;

Therefore, be it RESOLVED that any significant changes to members’ healthcare be submitted to the Delegate Assembly for approval, that the changes will be clearly outlined in detail, and that the Delegate Assembly will receive the details of the proposed changes at least one month before being asked to vote on them.

Summary: The chapter was being asked to approve submitting this resolution to the Delegate Assembly. The resolution was prepared by the RTC Executive Board (I was one of the people who worked on it).

Commentary - it is absolutely amazing that the RTC members are considering a resolution. After Michele Rayvid moved it (she read it, and motivated it “of course we want a say”) Bennett opened the floor for debate. Others have pointed out, parliamentary procedure was not our strong point yesterday. We will work on that. But both sides were heard. The debate was respectful.

Then the question was called. And the vote on zoom was 909 - 208 to call the question; in the hall it was 231 - 47 to call the question. And at 1140 - 255 (82%) the question was called. On the resolution the vote was 186 in favor and 91 against in the hall, and 881 in favor to 277 against on zoom, for a total of 1067 in favor and 368, and the motion carried with over 74% in favor.

The motion was to bring this resolution to the Delegate Assembly. So not done yet.

JD Organizing in Retirement

So I’m going to call yesterday the result of a good bit of organizing. That was a good meeting. We set a good tone. We got a good result. And I think we have raised expectations - we will have more organizing to do if we are going to meet those meet those expectations. And the “we” - I’m in there somewhere.

So, yeah, the title fits. And I should have more to say.