Rahm Emanuel Seeks Injunction To End Chicago Teachers Strike [UPDATE]
By Chuck Sudo in News on Sep 17, 2012 2:45PM
Throughout the duration of the Chicago teachers’ strike Mayor Rahm Emanuel has had a look on his face that members of Congress wore whenever he bullied them during his time on the Beltway. Now it looks as though Emanuel has reached his breaking point.
The mayor announced he would seek an injunction to force teachers back to work after the Chicago Teachers Union said the strike would last through at least Tuesday while the union’s Board of Delegates takes the proposed contract to union members for review.
Emanuel said in a statement:
I will not stand by while the children of Chicago are played as pawns in an internal dispute within a union. This was a strike of choice and is now a delay of choice that is wrong for our children. Every day our kids are kept out of school is one more day we fail in our mission: to ensure that every child in every community has an education that matches their potential. I have instructed the City's Corporation Counsel to work with the General Counsel of Chicago Public Schools to file an injunction in circuit court to immediately end this strike and get our children back in the classroom. This continued action by union leadership is illegal on two grounds - it is over issues that are deemed by state law to be non-strikable, and it endangers the health and safety of our children. I have also asked the President of the Board of Education, David Vitale, and the CEO of Chicago Public Schools, Jean-Claude Brizard, to explore every action possible to get our kids back into a classroom or educational facility. While the union works through its remaining issues, there is no reason why the children of Chicago should not be back in the classroom as they had been for weeks while negotiators worked through these same issues.
Chicago School Board President David Vitale said there is no reason why teachers can’t go back to work while the contract is being reviewed.
One of the reasons CTU announced the strike would continue was the timing of the Board of Delegates meeting. The 3 p.m. Sunday start time gave the Board of Delegates only a few hours to review the proposed deal before the beginning of Rosh Hashanah, which had some Jewish delegates feeling pressured to approve a deal they hadn’t reviewed fully. NBC Chicago reports there’s also some infighting among union members who believe CTU President Karen Lewis and her bargaining team didn’t fight hard enough for an equitable deal. NBC Chicago’s source said Lewis’s own caucus shouted obscenities at her and told Lewis and other union executives “you sold out.” This faction of the union is expected to vote “no.”
The Board of Delegates is slated to reconvene Tuesday.
Update 11:25 a.m. CST: Cook County Circuit Court Judge Peter Flynn deferred a hearing on the injunction until Wednesday.