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The Chicago Lecturers Union is escalating a combat with CEO Pedro Martinez as its contract negotiations drag on, with the union accusing the colleges chief of plotting to shut or consolidate underenrolled faculties.
Martinez says there are not any such plans, and that the district’s latest evaluation of its buildings led to the conclusion that closures have been pointless. State legislation bars Chicago from closing public faculties till Jan. 15, 2025.
“Let me reiterate: I cannot advocate that any faculties be closed throughout my management of CPS,” Martinez wrote to district households this week.
However CTU has doubled down, arguing that the existence of the evaluation — which neither CTU nor the district would supply to Chalkbeat — is an issue. Jackson Potter, the union’s vp, advised Chalkbeat Wednesday that faculty board members ought to contemplate eradicating Martinez over the evaluation, calling the colleges chief a “big barrier to our collective success.”
The back-and-forth is an indication that the union is seeking to put further strain on the CEO as negotiations proceed. Martinez, appointed by former Mayor Lori Lightfoot, is already on shaky floor, with Mayor Brandon Johnson, a former CTU organizer and shut ally of the union, reportedly contemplating ousting him. And in a metropolis the place the shuttering of roughly 50 campuses a decade in the past nonetheless touches a nerve, the union’s allegations are eye-catching — even when it’s unlikely the colleges chief would pursue politically unpopular closures underneath a mayor and college board that oppose them.
The confrontation over closures comes because the district faces looming funds deficits and after Martinez has clashed with each the mayor and the union. The CEO not too long ago rejected an attraction from Johnson to take out a high-interest short-term mortgage to cowl a $175 million worker pension cost and the price of the instructor contract. In the meantime, the union has lambasted Martinez for restricted progress in the talks over the CTU’s slate of proposals, the union’s most far-reaching and costliest to this point.
In a press release to Chalkbeat, CPS spokesperson Mary Ann Fergus reiterated that there are not any plans to shut or consolidate faculties.
College board President Jianan Shi and Vice President Elizabeth Todd-Breland didn’t reply to requests for remark.
The amenities evaluation: what we all know
Though the arrival of migrant households helped push enrollment up final fall, CPS has grappled for years with enrollment declines which have left a lot of its campuses underenrolled, particularly on town’s South and West sides. Easy methods to finest handle the problem of shrinking faculties is a problem districts throughout the nation are going through post-pandemic, amplifying fears of attainable closures.
In a letter to households earlier this week, Martinez mentioned the district performed a neighborhood-by-neighborhood amenities evaluation to tell a brand new five-year strategic plan that prioritizes efforts to prop up neighborhood faculties. In separate communication to workers, he mentioned the varsity board requested the examine.
In his letters to oldsters and workers, Martinez mentioned the district wouldn’t contemplate a consolidation plan with out first consulting households and residents. He famous that the district is presently wanting into two particular strikes: a brand new residence for the Velma Thomas Early Childhood Heart and transferring the seventh and eighth grade from Kelvyn Park Excessive College to 3 neighborhood elementary faculties.
Officers have additionally identified the state moratorium in opposition to college closures in Chicago, which expires in January on the identical day a partly-elected college board can be sworn in. Johnson’s administration and his appointed college board have mentioned unequivocally that they don’t have any urge for food for closing campuses, although they opposed a invoice in Springfield that, partially, would’ve prolonged the moratorium to 2027.
Regardless of Martinez’s reassurances, union officers have repeated their declare that the district is contemplating closing faculties, together with throughout public remark on the college board’s Wednesday assembly.
Potter mentioned the evaluation CTU obtained included an in depth record of roughly 70 faculties that could possibly be consolidated with 70 different campuses. He additionally mentioned the union has inside funds slides that reference consolidation as one choice for addressing the district’s monetary woes, with workers furloughs as one other chance.
“Why would a CEO have a listing of 140 consolidations? Why would that be generated in such an in depth method in the event that they weren’t contemplating it?” Potter mentioned. “That’s a waste of time and sources.”
Fergus, the district spokesperson, reiterated that the district reviewed facility utilization as a part of ongoing work associated to the Schooling Services Grasp Plan and its annual capital plan.
By state legislation, Fergus mentioned, CPS is required to put up pointers by Oct. 1 for “college actions,” a time period used to explain modifications to a faculty. She mentioned solely co-locations – when faculties share a constructing – could be thought-about and might solely be explored by CPS as soon as a faculty group has requested it.
As negotiations proceed and metropolis funds looms, extra strain on Martinez
The backdrop to this combat is the continued contract negotiations.
After months of little progress, the district and union introduced in a mediator to supervise the contract talks final month. On the bargaining desk, the district has provided academics raises of as much as 5% within the subsequent 4 years, which officers say will convey the typical educator wage to greater than $110,000 by the top of the contract, together with profit will increase without charge to academics and different concessions. However the district has balked on the union’s proposals to codify class sizes and staffing minimums within the contract, amongst others. The 2 are scheduled to cut price in public subsequent Tuesday.
Additionally looming is strain on Johnson to shut a $223 million deficit within the Metropolis of Chicago’s present funds and shut subsequent 12 months’s almost $1 billion hole. Each gaps within the metropolis’s funds, which covers metropolis companies comparable to police and hearth, public libraries, and streets and sanitation, exist partly as a result of the varsity board handed a $9.9 billion funds this summer season that didn’t embrace cash for the pensions of non-teaching workers. The CTU as soon as sharply criticized Lightfoot when she handed on this similar pension cost to the varsity district throughout her tenure.
Johnson steered CPS take out a high-interest, short-term mortgage, however district leaders, backed by the varsity board, have mentioned short-term borrowing to cowl these prices would solely add to CPS’s already substantial debt. Reviews that Johnson was laying the groundwork to take away Martinez emerged in August amid this disagreement.
The union has made its displeasure with Martinez clear, arguing that district officers – and Martinez particularly – have didn’t foyer state lawmakers and the governor aggressively for extra funding.
Potter mentioned union leaders to his data haven’t spoken with board members about eradicating Martinez. However he famous that since stories first got here out that Johnson was planning to oust the colleges chief, the district and union have made extra headway on the bargaining desk — “enhancements within the tempo and seriousness of bargaining.”
Nonetheless, he mentioned, “If each time we make incremental progress on the bargaining desk it’s as a result of we now have to threaten Pedro Martinez’s job, that’s not a wholesome commonplace. It’s an not possible one.”
The CEO nonetheless has the assist of many college leaders. Earlier this month, roughly 460 principals and assistant principals wrote to the varsity board arguing that after years of management turnover, Martinez is making progress in main the district and his removing weeks into a brand new college 12 months would trigger vital disruption for college students and workers.
Mila Koumpilova is Chalkbeat Chicago’s senior reporter protecting Chicago Public Faculties. Contact Mila at mkoumpilova@chalkbeat.org .
