Labor
So this is the final month of severance pay from the editing job that I lost in the spring. We’ve resources for approximately another six months — longer if my wife goes back to work. The local economy is such, however, that even if we were comfortable putting our children in daycare to allow for…
Ian Donnis writes in this week’s Providence Phoenix about the Industrial Workers of the World’s August 26 protest and the IWW mission in general. Donnis asks a sensible question, too often glossed over by the MSM when covering events like the North Providence rally…Considering how the IWW has mostly been a barely perceptible entity since…
I endorse John’s words in the Comments section of Justin’s post entitled Children Are Their Life? No, Children Are Their Leverage.: Maybe someday in RI a school committee will have the guts to fire striking teachers, replace them with new ones, and say to the union, “see you in court.” I have no doubt where…
It occurs to me that several buildings’ worth of kindergarteners began their school experiences last week in Tiverton. What a wonderful early educational experience this would be: The teachers union membership this evening authorized its negotiating committee to call a strike if it deemed it necessary next Tuesday. Amy Mullen, the NEA-Tiverton teachers union president,…
As a former member of the East Greenwich School Committee, I read Justin’s post about Pat Crowley’s comments on the Burrillville teachers’ strike with a certain bemusement. Justin touches on one of the really big issues about RI teachers’ union contract negotiations: It is my experience that it was the teachers’ union who demanded that…
In a comment to my post on the Burrillville teacher strike, Pat Crowley challenges me as follows: Justin, I wish you would take the time to really investigate the issues instead of having this ivory tower, knee-jerk reaction. This relates to something that has bothered me as I’ve followed news reports about the Tiverton teacher…
Patrick lays on the charm in the public-media negotiation process with the Tiverton school committee: Union spokesman Patrick Crowley replied, “It’s unfortunate that the School Committee has not taken the time to do the math accurately, and in addition to our mediation request we’re going to suggest that they get math remediation as well.” Yup,…
I’ve been meaning to note the chutzpa of retired state employee Robert Davis’s recent letter to the Providence Journal: Why is The Journal so preoccupied with the money that state workers make? Recent articles have explored who is the highest-paid state worker and how much overtime is being paid, as if the state workers were…
Shame on the Burrillville teachers for striking. As the people — especially parents — of that town are discovering, there is no better example of the teachers’ unions’ profoundly unreasonable power than their failure to obey the law and decline to strike. The district should fire anybody who doesn’t show up for work tomorrow, and…
I paid a visit to yesterday’s Industrial Workers of the World rally in North Providence, nominally a protest against the North Providence police department in response to the events of the August 11 confrontation between IWW protester Alex Svoboda and the North Providence Police. Mark Arsenault and Lynn Arditi describe the rally in today’s Projo.…
