Teachers Protest CPS Budget Cuts, Layoffs
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A large group of Chicago teachers and supporters was venting frustration with the Chicago Public Schools and the Emanuel administration on Thursday, as the Chicago Public Schools began laying off hundreds of employees after making a massive contribution to the teachers' pension fund.
Protesters said the district's proposed layoffs and other spending cuts are unacceptable.
Public school teachers were raising their voices against Mayor Rahm Emanuel's leadership of the district; in particular his proposal to help shore up CPS finances by having teachers pay the full cost of their individual pension contributions, most of which is now paid by the district.
Around 100 members of the CTU marched outside City Hall, protesting $200 million in budget cuts which triggered more than 1,000 layoffs.
Emanuel also presented a long-term financial plan for CPS on Wednesday, including a requirement that teachers pay their full 9% individual pension contributions. Right now, they pay only 2%, with CPS picking up the rest, which means the mayor's plan amounts to a 7% pay cut.
CTU members said that's intolerable.
"I'm the primary bread-winner for my family. I can't afford any pay cut whatsoever, and that pension pickup was negotiated in lieu of raises in the 1980s, so that would be a huge step backward for teachers," Roosevelt High School teacher Tim Meegan said.
Podcast
On Tuesday, the district made a required $634 million contribution to the teachers' pension fund, and had to borrow money to do so.
That payment triggered approximately 1,400 job cuts – including more than 1,000 layoffs, and 350 vacant jobs that will remain unfilled. CPS officials said most of the job cuts would be at the central office, and "very few" teachers would be laid off, but did not provide specifics on what positions are being eliminated.
The district also said it would cut spending in other areas by eliminating pay for elementary school coaches, doing away with central funding for elementary school athletics, reducing busing, eliminating start-up funding for new charter schools, reducing funding for teacher development, and cutting back on school repair and maintenance budgets.
Emanuel insisted the cuts would not affect the classroom, but CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey said, "It is clear that what cuts have been specified would do real damage to our schools."
Emanuel said the cuts were necessary because state lawmakers, who can't agree on the state budget, rejected a proposal that would have given CPS more time to come up with a longer-term pension solution.
"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.
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.
The mayor offered to raise property taxes by $225 million, if it's part of the larger deal he's seeking.
The mayor has insisted if he is going to ask Chicago businesses and homeowners to pay more in property taxes, and ask state lawmakers to provide more aid to CPS, everyone must feel part of the pain, including teachers.
Craig Cleve, a social studies teacher at Columbia Explorers Elementary Academy, scoffed at that contention.
"I think the mayor is deeply indebted in Novocain right now. I don't think he feels the pain, and I think the city's in enough trouble right now, and it's certainly feeling the pain; not simply middle-class teachers who have jobs, but also people in the city who don't," he said.
