From the Salt Lake Tribune:
In this time of budget cuts, Utah school districts should not spend money on local teacher union leaders, says one lawmaker.
Rep. Christopher Herrod, R-Provo, is running a bill, HB381, that would prohibit school districts from paying local union association presidents’ salaries. Now, districts such as Davis, Granite and Salt Lake pay their local Utah Education Association (UEA) presidents between $24,000 to $28,000 a year even though they are no longer teaching, and the union pays the rest of their salaries according to contract agreements.
“It’s important as much money go to the classroom as possible,” Herrod said. “Taxpayers need to know where their money is being spent.”
Herrod’s bill would prohibit paid association leaves and force unions to reimburse the district for any costs associated with the employee, such as benefits. Now, the law allows paid leave as long as the association leader directly affects education within the school district.
Herrod said his bill would still allow districts to pay association leaders salaries, but only if they took on other specific positions for the district in addition to union leadership.
“What I don’t think is fair is to say, ‘Just because I’m working for the union, it benefits the school,’ ” Herrod said.
Campbell said local association leaders help school districts by giving teachers — who are too busy teaching during the day to attend decision-making meetings — a voice.
“If there isn’t an organizing voice there isn’t a voice at all,” Campbell said. “All you have is chaos and squeaky wheels.”
The bill was sent to the House on Monday to await a hearing, likely in committee.
My mother and most of my extended family are educators, and yet not one is a member of the UEA. While I am not completely decided on this issue, I do see the importance of rexamining the role that state unions such as the UEA play in society, and whether they are worth the tax dollars that eventually go to them.
I will not deny that the UEA has played an important role in helping to raise teacher salaries and in accomplishing similarly beneficial goals for education, nevertheless, I am often skeptical of unions and whether or not they truly make a meaningful difference in the lives of their members; some unions have proven to be crippling to their industries and therefore, do not truly benefit union members. Yet in the case of HB381, I am still undecided as to whether this bill really fixes something we could consider “broken.” And I am also somewhat reluctant to take it seriously in light of other education bills like SB199, which seems to clearly be vindictive.
Is this just another bill designed to seek retribution for the voucher failure? Is this bill going to make a positive difference by checking excess in unions like the UEA? Will it ultimately enhance education in Utah, or will it do harm?
I don’t have the answers to these questions for I am still undecided. What do you think?
- Marc
“I will not deny that the UEA has played an important role in helping to raise teacher salaries and in accomplishing similarly beneficial goals for education….”
Um, relative to what? The fact of the matter is that we have an effective monopoly in our K-12 education system. Monopolies have full power to keep workers’ wages low. Simply because it is a government-run monopoly does not alter this basic law of economics.
So, in essence, you are saying that we need a union to counteract the inherent problems of low wages in our monopoly system. The fact that educator unions work hard to subsidize higher pay for tenured employees with low entry wages is not even recognized. The good that educator unions do does not compensate for the bad they do.
Perhaps it’s time to re-evaluate the whole monopoly thing. Doing so might render the unions unnecessary.