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1) NEA's Glowing Membership Numbers
Dim a Little. NEA's active membership numbers for
2003-04 were the worst in decades, with the union adding only 3,200 employed
members. But NEA was able to turn things around in 2004-05, and happily
boasted to its convention delegates of an increase of 45,000 members, broken
down as 17,956 more teachers, 17,455 more education support employees, and
the rest new student and retired members (all those numbers as of July 1,
2005).
Well, the 2004-05 school and fiscal year
ended on August 31, and the final numbers slipped a bit. NEA still ended
with more than 35,000 new members, which is certainly a marked improvement
over the previous year, but July's good news has a little tarnish.
NEA ended the year with 11,342 more
teachers and 15,055 more education support employees. EIA has no
state-by-state rundown of these figures, but assumes the usual: the big
state affiliates got bigger, and the struggling ones continued to struggle.
Flat enrollment and increased
retirements will dictate the overall trend of NEA's fortunes in the near
term. But the great unknown is how a new generation of teachers will
interact with the union. If the
NEA surveys are any indication, those signs are not all that promising.
2) California Dues Increase Is
Already Spent. The
class action lawsuit filed against the California Teachers Association
by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation has already yielded
ominous news for CTA members. Sacramento Bee political columnist
Daniel Weintraub
posted on his blog a declaration filed by Carlos Moreno, who is CTA's
controller. In a successful effort to block a restraining order by Right to
Work against collecting the $54 million dues increase, Moreno and CTA
spelled out for the district court why such an order would have been
devastating to the union's finances.
Moreno described a $14 million loan
(probably the headquarters mortgage) and an outstanding $20 million line of
credit. But the key statement in the declaration is this: "CTA has already
spent on the initiative campaign the equivalent of what the temporary dues
increase would bring in over three years. CTA is in the process of
negotiating a necessary $40 million line of credit."
EIA doesn't pretend to have extensive
knowledge of banking and finance, but if the dues increase has already been
spent, it seems the union will need further collateral to secure an
additional $40 million. Where will this money come from, I wonder?
The answer, of course, is the members.
CTA currently extracts $36 per member for its initiative fund, but few
remember that that permanent assessment began as a temporary dues increase
to fund opposition to the 1993 voucher initiative. What easier way to close
the debt than to extend the current dues increase?
NEA, which donated $2.5 million to the
CTA campaign last year, approved an allocation of another $2.5 million last
weekend. The national union has already authorized up to $2.5 million more
to CTA, should it be needed.
3) CQE Update.
If EIA didn't write about it, people might be in danger of forgetting that
Communities for Quality Education (CQE –
formerly America Learns) is an NEA front group, created and funded in
order to promote the union's agenda against the No Child Left Behind Act.
Despite the millions dropped in its coffers, CQE's efforts fell short in the
2004 election. So the group has had to return to its only real source of
support: NEA and its affiliates. The latest to pony up were the Iowa State
Education Association and the Ohio Education Association, both of whom
pledged 50 cents per member to CQE. That's a combined amount of about
$80,000.
4) Holes in the Web.
Over the past few years, NEA and its affiliates have sunk millions of
dollars into their Internet presence. From the now-defunct OWL.org to NEA
Interactive, the national union has not only sought to use the web to
organize members on national issues, but has subsidized and encouraged
similar efforts by its state affiliates. However, the union's member surveys
suggest these efforts may not be having much impact.
Only 35 percent of members have ever
visited their state association's web site, and only 31 percent have ever
visited nea.org. Of those visitors, only 17 percent have visited their state
site more than three times in the three months prior to the survey. Only 8
percent had visited the NEA site that often. Putting those figures together,
only 6 percent of the total NEA membership visit their state web site more
than once a month, and only 2.5 percent visit nea.org more than once a
month.
Among local presidents, 78 percent say
they have used the state association web site (no figures on frequency), and
65 percent say they have visited nea.org. But of those who have visited
nea.org, only 21 percent have visited more than three times in the three
months before the survey. So, fewer than 14 of every 100 NEA local
presidents visited nea.org more than once a month.
But EIA has even worse news. According
to the rankings compiled by Alexa.com,
EIA has more web traffic than all but one NEA state affiliate -- and is
closing in on the California Teachers Association. NEA's national web site
is still well out of reach, but it's something to shoot for.
5) NEA Wants to Trim the Fat.
The January 2006 issue of NEA Today will contain a feature story on
diets. The publication is asking members about diets they have tried.
Well, they ought to focus on
San Diego County, but EIA wonders how the union will handle any mention
of Atkins Nutritionals (see "Coincidence
or Bad Karma?" in the August 1, 2005 EIA Communiqué).
6) Negotiations Are Confidential,
Unless We Want to Tell Everyone. The Shepherd
Education Association in Michigan is outraged because the school district
published and mailed a brochure with details of the bargaining positions of
both sides in current contract negotiations.
Union president Dee Brock called the
mailing a "smear campaign" and said she was stunned the district would
release the bargaining positions publicly.
Meanwhile, over in Pennsylvania, the
Crestwood Education Association has posted the school board's last contract
proposal on its web site. "We wanted to get this information out there,"
said union president Joe Chmiola. Missing is any similar broadcasting of the
union's proposal.
7) Quote of
the Week.
"We stand by our members no matter how they vote. The main
list is at the CTA office. I go in and put down how each person's going to
vote. I have no idea what they're going to do with the list." – Antelope
Valley Teachers Association official Gary Roberts. The union is giving a
printed survey to its members, asking them how they are going to vote on
California's Propositions 74, 75 and 76, and then asking them to put their
name on the survey and return it to the union's site representative.
(September 30 Antelope Valley Press) |
