- S.B. 5 is a jobs killer. It will only weaken the Middle Class by destroying good, working-class jobs that families and communities depend on.
- S.B. 5 will hurt businesses. Stores, gas stations, restaurants and other merchants in communities across the state will be forced to lay off workers. Or worse, they’ll have to close their doors, because Middle Class Ohioans will no longer be able to afford to patronize those establishments.
- Public Employees are our neighbors. They are firefighters, cops, teachers, prison guards, snowplow drivers, and social workers, to name a few. But they are also coaches, athletic and band boosters, church members, volunteer firefighters and charitable givers.
- Public employees are taxpayers. Public employees pay their taxes just like everyone else. Every payday, they pay the same percentage of income tax as every working Ohioan.
- S.B. 5 won’t balance the budget. Even if EVERY state employee was fired, it would barely save the state one-fourth of its gaping $8 billion budget deficit.
- S.B. 5 is part of a larger agenda and public workers are scapegoats. It’s a fact! S.B. 5 won’t balance the budget. It’s clear that anti-worker forces are using this to harm the Middle Class and kill jobs and the union rights they depend on.
The Reckless Budget
The Budget Facts, so far
- The budget leaves school districts with $3.1 billion less overall funding over the next two years. That means school districts will have 11.5% less total funding next year, and a 4.5% further decrease in the budget’s second year, forcing drastic cuts and property tax increases.
- There are no strategies to make up for an estimated $800 million in annual lost federal funding.
- The budget reneges on “hold harmless” payments to schools during the phase-out period for Tangible Personal Property Taxes, costing school districts $678 million over two years.
- The budget provides nearly $400 million less over the biennium to higher education, including a 5% cut to the Ohio College Opportunity Grant next year.
- The cuts extend to nearly every area of education – early childhood, special education, prison education and instruction for incarcerated youths.
More information is available and will be added, at the menu on the right.
Talking Points
S.B. 5 TARGETS COLLECTIVE BARGAINING FOR ELIMINATION
- Children need their teachers to focus on them and their classrooms. Allowing the union to represent teachers frees teachers to do what they do best: teach.
- Taking away the union’s role in support of teachers will mean teacher salaries would be dictated by state politicians and education bureaucrats.
- Senate Bill 5 will hurt our local schools and kids because taking the unions out of the picture will make it easier for politicians to lay off teachers and cut funding for schools across Ohio.
- Collective bargaining allows educators a voice in improving opportunities for Ohio’s students, better classroom resources and improved teaching and learning conditions.
- Teachers know best what’s needed to improve student learning, and collective bargaining gives allows them to focus on teaching rather than time-‐consuming employment issues.
- Educators, like all public employees, are an integral part of the fabric of Ohio’s communities.
- Senate Bill 5 weakens Ohio. Rather than creating jobs, this legislation will hurt local communities, reversing Ohio’s positive economic outlook.
- Ohio’s collective bargaining law has created a framework for problem-‐solving that has made strikes rare. Local teachers associations negotiate effectively to avoid disruption for student learning.
- In a tough economy, with Ohio facing a major budget deficit, we must focus on the essentials. Nothing is more essential than giving our children a quality education that prepares them for good jobs.
Studies and facts about collective bargaining
The public does not support attacks on working families:
A January 2011 Quinnipiac poll showed that Ohio voters oppose limits on collective bargaining by public employees by 51% to 34%, a 17 % margin.
Ohio’s public employees make less than the private sector:
A Rutgers University study for the Economic Policy Institute released in February 2011 finds that similarly educated public employees make less than their private sector peers.
Looking at total compensation (wages and nonwage benefits), Ohio public employees annually earn 6% less than comparable private sector employees and 3.5% less on an hourly basis than comparable private sector employees.
Collective bargaining did not cause Ohio’s budget deficit:
Policy Matters Ohio recently released a study showing that states without public employee collective bargaining are facing the same large budget deficits as state with collective bargaining.
Collective bargaining supports high quality education:
The National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP, 2008) suggests that students in states with CB perform better than those in states without CB: reading and math (4th & 8th grades; average freshman graduation rate).
Senate Bill 5 Facts
Senate Bill 5, introduced by Senator Shannon Jones (R-‐Springboro), proposes to end collective bargaining for state and higher education employees and drastically curtail bargaining rights for K-‐12 educators.
Ohio’s educators and working families are aggressively opposing this bill.
What’s at stake?:
Collective bargaining allows educators a voice in improving working and learning conditions and opportunities for Ohio's students. This bill would take Ohio backwards and harm students, working families and local economies throughout the state. In today's difficult economic times, we all need to be focused on the essentials.
Nothing is more essential than giving our students and children a quality education that prepares them for good jobs.
Senate Bill 5 does the following:
- Eliminates collective bargaining for state employees and employees of state higher education institutions.
- Does not allow K-‐12 school employees to collectively bargain on salaries or healthcare.
- Eliminates public employee salary schedules and step increases and replaces them with an undefined “merit” pay system.
- Permits school boards to govern healthcare benefit plans for employees and requires public employees to pay at least 20% of their healthcare costs.
- Eliminates continuing contracts for teachers after the bill’s effective date.
- Eliminates teacher leave policies in statute and requires local school boards to determine leave time.
- Eliminates experience as a sole criterion for Reductions In Force (RIFs).
- Allows public employers to hire permanent replacement workers during a strike.
- Prohibits school districts from picking up any portion of the employee’s contribution to the pension system.
- Allows a public employer in “fiscal emergency” to serve notice to terminate, modify or negotiate a CBA.
- Abolishes the School Employee Healthcare Board.
What can you do to help support students, working families and local communities?:
The elected officials that represent you need to hear that you oppose Senate Bill 5 and the effort to eliminate collective bargaining.
We need to highlight that collective bargaining benefits students, and you'd know that the best because educators are serving the students every day.
Also, please recruit your colleagues to help fight this extremely harmful legislation.
You can do this by calling the education hotline. Call 1-888-907-7309, and let legislators know how you feel.
Issues & Action Areas
No one can deny that education is the engine that drives our country forward, and that teachers and education support professionals are the people who steer our children in the right direction.
Each and every day our children grow a little bit more through the knowledge they gain in the classroom, and the examples they see set by their teachers.
Supporting public education and the professionals who work in our schools is crucial to our long term future and the future of our children.
Join the Future seeks to provide you, as supporters of public education and its professionals, the information, tools and news needed to preserve this vital public service as it comes under ever greater pressure from reactionary forces seeking to tear down decades of progress.
From the menu on the left you can navigate to information and resources regarding issues and actions that are vital to this goal. Thanks for Joining the Future and helping us fight to preserve a world class education for our children. We appreciate the support you give the world-class professionals who work hard every day to help our students succeed.
News for March 16th, 2011
in Article
Aftershocks of yesterdays assault on public education by the Governor are coming into focus. Innovation Ohio (pdf) has the 20,000 foot view
- While Gov. Kasich’s office has released spreadsheets claiming school districts would see slight 1% increases from the previous year, the comparison does not factor in the stimulus money that was distributed through the foundation formula in FY 11. In other words, the Administration pretends that the stimulus money never happened.
- However, when the stimulus money from FY 11 is included, Gov. Kasich’s budget actually proposes a $395 million cut in FY 12 from what school districts had FY 11 ( a 6.1% cut to districts statewide), and a $305 million reduction (4.7%) in FY 13 from what they received FY 11.1
- On average, this means that districts would have to either raise an additional 1.59 mills to make up the Governor’s cuts, or drastically cut education services to their children.
- Using an average salary of $55,2502 for teachers in Ohio, these cuts represent 7,149 teachers, and would likely result in significant layoffs.
According to early OEA analysis
The plan slashes funding to K-12 public education by 11.5 percent, from $11.5 billion in the current year to $10.2 billion next year, ratcheting down to $9.7 billion in fiscal 2013.
As the Dayton Daily News notes
Both K-12 and higher education would see massive changes and double-digit cuts to funding under Gov. John Kasich’s two-year budget unveiled Tuesday.
School districts across the state are trying to analyze the impact of this draconian budget
AKRON, Ohio - School districts across Ohio are analyzing Governor John Kasich's budget to determine how it will impact funding for 2012 and 2013.
David James, the superintendent of Akron Public Schools, did not comment on the budget Tuesday because he needed more time to sift through it.
Without a funding formula available, assessing the true cost to each district will be impossible. As further news, analysis and developments happen, Join the Future will bring you those updates.
In further news, State Superintendent Delisle resigned under pressure from the Governor, her parting comments
"Last Friday, it was made known to me by two members of the governor's staff that my tenure was limited," Delisle said during the board's monthly meeting in Columbus. "They said they have the votes to replace me."
Her resignation takes effect April 30.
Delisle said she was asked "to support the governor's budget and remain ambivalent about it. I said I hadn't seen it. ... I perceived (the comments) as bribery or a threat."
She said she was told that "if I did good, there would be a nice exit strategy."
Stay tuned to Join the Future for more.