Chicago Teachers Union Vice President Jesse Sharkey.
The union response to Rahm Emanuel’s attack on public employee pensions was swift and tough. At least from most of the union leadership representing affected pension members.
Bill Dougherty of the Fraternal Order of Police:
“I would never agree to something like this. The Lodge has always been willing to sit down and solve problems with the city. But, if the mayor’s only idea is diminishing our pensions and kicking the can down the road, we are not interested. It’s totally against the state constitution. Your benefits cannot be diminished. There was something passed for state employees. That’s already being challenged. The mayor is rushing to get something done before that challenge comes through because he knows it’s gonna be declared unconstitutional.
Our members have put in their required contribution since the day they came on the job. It’s the city that refused to follow their own actuarial study that says the city needs to contribute more. The bill fixes that. It forces them to contribute the funding properly. It’s not in one lump. That’s a myth [Emanuel] put out there. It begins in 2015 but they have until 2040 to get the fund to 90 percent,”
Stacy Davis, Political Director of the Chicago Teachers Union:
“These people are our lunch ladies. These people are our janitors. These people are our teachers’ aides. These people live overwhelmingly on the South and West Sides of this city. This is a terrible deal for these people, and we intend to fight it with every fiber of our union.”
Jesse Sharkey, VP of the CTU:
“This amounts to balancing the city’s budget on the backs of some of the poorest people in this city who are least able to afford these kind of attacks. If the Mayor wants to make real pension reform, he needs to talk more honestly about more creative ways of finding revenue and not just taxing homeowners.”
But Christine Boardman, President of SEIU Local 73.
“We’re in support of the increase in employee contributions. We’re in support of the Emanuel plan to try to fund it through property tax increases. The bill is going to pass. I know that. You know that. We’re not gonna work against the bill. We’ve told that to Speaker Madigan. We’re gonna be neutral, only because of the effect it has on retirees.”
Chicago Park District employees represented by SEIU Local 73 were already victims of pension theft when the General Assembly approved a recent cut in their pensions.
Did the Sun-Times get that right? Did SEIU Local 73 President Christine Boardman really say that?
Fred Klonsky 
She must be in line for a job with Rahm. How pitiful
The SEIU Local 73 is being coerced by Rahm for political gain. The last time they refused a city offer of pay cuts at O’Hare, their members were fired, their jobs were all “privatized” to a company owned by friends of the mayor.
We must not put too much credibility into “at gunpoint” statements. We must learn from it to not underestimate the ruthlessness of “negotiations” with anti-union politicians. This is what we all can expect from Rauner. To be forewarned is to be forearmed. We must get everyone out to vote against Rauner. Many seniors do not drive anymore, we should offer them rides to the polling places if they want to vote.
Coerced? Then what are our unions for?
Rahm is in a position to fire and privatize a lot of SEIU 73s members jobs.
CTU, not as easy as Rahm found out during the last strike.
Decades ago, the unions had the right to refuse to cross other Union’s picket lines. “We don’t go back to work until everyone goes back to work”.
Teaching assistants, security, engineers, custodians, plumbers, electricians, all had contracts with the same effective dates as the CTU. Each contract was not effective until each and every other union also had a ratified contract.
Now Rahm is trying to divide and conquer.
To sell us out.
A little confused here about the ability of a union president/board to bind the members absent a contract ratification vote. The police sergeants voted no to a “deal” negotiated by their union leaders which sold them out on the pensions and the deal died. Union members need to make it clear to their boards that they will face the same fate if a sell-out deal is brought back. About the only aspect of this I can see where the union president/board might have unilateral authority would be the decision to file/finance a lawsuit challenging the law. Of course, that would not prevent any union member from going ahead with a legal challenge.
There is a lot wrong with the SEIU. SEIU made deals with Blago and Quinn to unionize home care workers who were once employees of the physically disabled person they worked for . SEIU sold out because they got a whole bunch of workers for nothing . Blago made them state workers and union members. But they are strange state workers who don’t get pensions but social security But now they get harassed and treated like crap like state workers. Even though they get paid more they really don’t because each disabled person used to get a lump of money and wide latitude. mind you these are physically disabled person. The one I know ran a small business once is is quite capable of dealing with employees
This is part of the supreme court case Harris v Quinn which could make ALL public workers right to work . It might also make these people some 10 -30,000 no longer state workers
SEIU needs to be kicked out of the coalition . If it wants to represent corrupt democrats fine But it has no business representing workers.
The IEA polling of its members is right Pensions are the issue IEA and IFT /CTU/UPI
need to merge into one powerful union That will win the pensions back and support education . They need to tell the AFL that we are keeping ALL our money in Illinois and we are spending it to get rid of Madigan
A VOTE FOR THESE PENSION THEFTS ARE A VOTE FOR A PRIMARY . A VOTE FOR MADIGAN IS A VOTE FOR A PRIMARY
The consolidation of SEIU locals into these huge mega-locals was designed and orchestrated by Andy Stern and other SEIU officials years ago. Prior to that stuff, as late as 2000, SEIU Local 46 represented the custodial workers and some others at CPS and was one of the strongest and best unions representing school workers in Chicago (even during the terrible days under CTU president Tom Reece and his group of sellout bandits). Then SEIU created these mega-locals. In the case of CPS janitors, the janitors were sucked into Local 73, which represents groups of workers as diverse as the school bus drivers in Gary Indiana and the Illinois tollway toll booth workers. That’s what gave Boardman here current powers and allowed not only the sellout of the janitors’ pensions this week but the recent scabbing on the Chicago Teachers Strike of 2012 and the recent quiet when CPS voted at the February meeting of the Board of Education to privatize the remaining janitorial jobs in CPS. This is not a question of psychology, but of long-term profitable personal interest. Ask instead how much the leadership cadre at SEIU Local 73 are paid in pay and benefits and the answer becomes more clear. Disclosure: I worked as “research director” at Local 73 during some of my “bad years” (blacklisted from teaching, unable to collect my CPS pension yet without taking a fatal penalty) and was forced out by Boardman after I took issue, publicly, with Andy Stern’s quoting a “study” that attacked Chicago public school teachers…