City Sues Teachers Union for Repping Members Ousted by After-School Program
(DNAINFO) Amy Zimmer | December 22, 2015 — An after-school program touted by Mayor Bill de Blasio and the Department of Education as part of a citywide extracurricular expansion last fall is now in the crosshairs of a battle between the city and the teachers union — after it replaced unionized teachers with private ones, according to a lawsuit.
The issue at the Lab School for Collaborative Studies, a selective middle school in Chelsea, began this fall when a long-standing after-school program was taken over by the 29-year-old after-school organization Manhattan Youth.
The nonprofit organization hired some of the same union teachers who had worked with the program previously, but paid them less than they made before, according to court papers filed over the incident. It also brought in non-union teachers.
The UFT filed a grievance against the DOE in September and then a Public Employment Relations Board complaint in October. Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña and the DOE hit back, filing a lawsuit last week in Manhattan Supreme Court against the UFT.