Emanuel Calls For State Action In Wake Of 'Intolerable' Cuts By CPS
(CBS) -- Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel called the $200 million in cuts CPS will make after making a $634 million pension payment "intolerable" and called for action from Springfield.
"In my view, they are intolerable, they are unacceptable, and they are totally unconscionable," Emanuel said. "They are the result of a political system that sprung a leak, and now it is a geyser."
Mayor Emanuel says he isn't asking Springfield to bail out the Chicago Public Schools, but he is demanding that the state make fundamental changes so that the system can resolve problems the legislature helped create.
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"I want Springfield to be clear, as it relates here, to get off their duff, start providing the political leadership to make decisions, to right the decades' worth of political wrongs that have existed over the years that got all of us to this point," Emanuel said.
The $200 million in cuts includes about 1,400 layoffs, which CPS Interim CEO Jesse Ruiz says starting being issued on Wednesday. Ruiz said the CPS central office would be the most affected by the cuts and that very few teachers would be laid off. Employees who work at the schools will not be notified of layoffs until later in the summer.
Other cuts include eliminating 5,300 coaching stipends at elementary schools, reducing funding for maintenance repairs by 25 percent, and leaving special education vacancies open.
Emanuel outlined two options, the first of which would create a uniform pension system throughout the state. The second option would include restoring the property tax pension levy to the pre-1995 rate of .26, having teachers contribute full nine percent into their pensions, and having the state increase education funding by 25 percent.
It didn't take long for the Chicago Teachers Union to respond to Emanuel's assertions. CTU vice president Sharkey said teachers won't agree to pick up the seven percent of pensions the board now pays, calling it a "pay cut" and "a fighting position."
In Springfield, a bill introduced by Senate President John Cullerton would grant at least some relief, with the state picking up Chicago's current $200 million pension payment while drastically reducing payments on past pension debt for two years.
But a CTU rep called it just more postponing the pain.
"Tying it to a two-year pension holiday only makes the problem larger," said Catherine Maley. "Pension holidays are bad."
But with state action uncertain, the mayor's still playing for time. CPS today essentially asked the teachers' pension board for a $500-million short term loan, the day after it paid that $634 million to the very same board.
