{"id":26186,"date":"2015-07-20T10:26:47","date_gmt":"2015-07-20T14:26:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/?p=26186"},"modified":"2015-07-20T09:34:36","modified_gmt":"2015-07-20T13:34:36","slug":"forget-the-fact-finding-its-time-to-go-to-court","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/?p=26186","title":{"rendered":"Forget the fact-finding; its time to go to court"},"content":{"rendered":"

Teachers, district pitted needlessly by state’s negligence (or worse)<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

By Mike McGann<\/strong><\/span>, Editor, The Times<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

\"UTMikeColLogo\"<\/a>Earlier this month, word got out that both the Unionville-Chadds Ford School District and its teachers\u2019 union, the Unionville-Chadds Ford Education Association, both will seek fact finding on their ongoing, and apparently stalled contract negotiations.<\/span><\/p>\n

Maybe its spending a week in the wilds of southern Alaska, maybe it is the sheer giddiness that comes with going more than a week without a PECO power outage at my home, but I feel oddly qualified to give you a preview of what the fact finder will determine after both sides make their presentations:<\/span><\/p>\n

They\u2019re both right.<\/span><\/p>\n

Okay, there will be lots of expository and nuance in the final report when we see it in a few months, but in the end, the fact finder will determine that the teachers deserve a raise and that the district can\u2019t give them one without putting program, jobs and educational quality at risk in the coming years.<\/span><\/p>\n

And yes, I know this district better than any other in the area\u2014 and I would argue better than most. As a parent, taxpayer, President of the Unionville-Chadds Ford Education Foundation and publisher of UCFConnect magazine, not to mention having covered the district in this publication for nearly five years, I\u2019ve had a ring-side seat, maybe like no one else. And because of long-standing relationships with both sides of this issue, I have no motivation to favor one side over the other.<\/span><\/p>\n

So, as I\u2019ve noted to both sides, I see myself as Switzerland \u2014 heavily armed and neutral (yet oddly fond of chocolate) \u2014 in this ongoing negotiation.<\/span><\/p>\n

From that outside position, I can see that our pals in Harrisburg \u2014 Republican and Democrat \u2014 have set up a scenario to pit teachers against school districts so no one notices either how lousy a job the state has done for a generation (or worse, that a small but active faction seeks to destroy public education, in favor of its clearly inferior, but for-profit private sector replacement, not out of an honest policy disagreement, but to line the pockets of a few already rich and powerful people).<\/span><\/p>\n

The evidence, from the pension mess to Act 1, the school tax increase limiting law \u2014 former Gov. Ed Rendell\u2019s lasting legacy to wreck education in Pennsylvania \u2014 is clear. In pretending to \u201cfight for property tax relief\u201d various governors and legislators did little more than gut public education, pander to big-dollar special interests and shirk their responsibilities, rather than actually look to solve the funding problem. And yes, the same dance is going on right now during the budget impasse.<\/span><\/p>\n

Here\u2019s a fun fact as to why your (and my) property tax is so high: a bit more than a generation ago, the state funded about 50% of the cost of public education. Now, between expensive unfunded mandates (special education is a particular disaster) and back-door funding cuts, that number is down to about 31% (in Unionville it is a single digit). Our beloved Politburo, uh, state legislature would like you to believe local taxes keep going up because local school boards spend too much money, but the truth is that the state has continually failed in its constitutionally mandated role to fund \u201cthorough and efficient\u201d education.<\/span><\/p>\n

Now, in no way, am I advocating reckless spending or giant pay increases for teachers. What I am advocating for is to allow folks in local districts like Unionville to make their own choices \u2014 through their elected school board \u2014 on what is right for their community and school district. We don\u2019t have that now.<\/span><\/p>\n

One needs only to look at the ongoing petty and stupid state budget negotiations \u2014 interest groups attacking legislators for cutting education spending and those same legislators using taxpayer funds to send out mailings saying \u201cno, I didn\u2019t\u201d \u2014 to know the solution will never, ever come from the legislature or the governor\u2019s mansion.<\/span><\/p>\n

No. It\u2019s time for this to head to the courts.<\/span><\/p>\n

Already, six Pennsylvania school districts \u2014 all facing financial crisis \u2014 filed suit last fall against the commonwealth over its failure to fund schools. Similar suits have been filed in New York, California, Tennessee and Kansas. Suits in Washington, Texas and other states have been successful.<\/span><\/p>\n

And while the suit clearly stands a good chance of success, imagine the impact if one of the top districts in the state \u2014 some say the top district \u2014 were to join the fight and lead. Heck, what if the top five school districts in the county joined the suit? I\u2019m pretty sure there would be no shortage of sheer panic of our local state legislators, already looking at a brutal and potentially disastrous 2016 election cycle.<\/span><\/p>\n

The teachers, the administration and the school board all have the same goal: continue to have an exceptional school district at a price the greater community can live with. Might not is make sense to reach a compromise one-year deal \u2014 as just done up in Neshaminy \u2014 so both sides can work together in taking on the state? <\/span><\/p>\n

Standing on the sideline of this great fight, while bashing each other locally, does no good. We must pull together as a community and work to find real solutions.<\/span><\/p>\n

The greater Unionville area has long been known for bravely leading when others would not. One only needs to look at all of the stops on the Underground Railroad here to know that. What might those brave folks say now about a lack of courage to fight for justice?<\/span><\/p>\n

At the end of the day, if we in Unionville have any pretense about truly being the best district in the state, we must lead. Not just in test scores, but in character and being willing to fight for what is right.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Teachers, district pitted needlessly by state’s negligence (or worse) By Mike McGann, Editor, The Times Earlier this month, word got out that both the Unionville-Chadds Ford School District and its teachers\u2019 union, the Unionville-Chadds Ford Education Association, both will seek fact finding on their ongoing, and apparently stalled contract negotiations. Maybe its spending a week […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":26185,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,7],"tags":[144,5408,666,1286],"class_list":["post-26186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-featured","tag-budget","tag-funding","tag-state-legislature","tag-unionville-chadds-ford-school-district"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26186","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=26186"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26186\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26187,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26186\/revisions\/26187"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/26185"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=26186"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=26186"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.unionvilletimes.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=26186"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}