Posted on 09/22/2005 5:33:10 PM PDT by NormsRevenge
SACRAMENTO (AP) - A small group of teachers and lawyers who are seeking class action status for a lawsuit against the California Teachers Association was drowned out by screams and chants Thursday as they tried to hold a news conference outside the union's office.
The National Right to Work Foundation, which filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Jose on behalf of six named teachers and professors, claims the CTA is illegally collecting a $60 levy in each of the next three years to pay for electioneering.
The union voted to raise dues by that amount in hopes of raising $50 million to pay for a campaign against Propositions 74, 75 and 76 on the Nov. 8 special election ballot.
The foundation unveiled its lawsuit at the CTA offices Thursday, but all its speakers were outshouted by around 100 teachers and other union supporters carrying pro-union placards and yelling "Shame on you."
"This is an example of the kind of intimidation, bullying and thuggery that our public school teachers are enduring (from the union) every day," said state Sen. Tom McClintock, R-Thousand Oaks, who was there to support the lawsuit.
The suit asks that all 335,000 educators who are members and "fee-payers" - those who already opt out of other political union activities - be notified in writing of their legal right not to pay the levy for a political campaign and have their money returned right away.
The 335,000 teachers, professors and others who are represented by the group were not consulted before the vote and "they certainly were not allowed an opportunity to object to, and prevent, this extraordinary expenditure of their money for politics," said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the foundation.
Lead attorney Milton Chappell said some of the plaintiffs were told it could take up to two years to get their refunds. The CTA said Thursday that anyone who has written to ask for the $60 will have it returned in October.
CTA President Barbara Kerr said the lawsuit "has no basis in fact or in law" and is a waste of the court's time.
The union has 20 days to respond.
Unions are destructive to America, oriented to the welfare of the leadership only, and truly evil.
In my experience, also the Nurses Union...what it produces is an aggressive personality bordering by some on the flippant...union members veiw the public as not customers but competition or worse, a bother, people "bothering" them and similar so they provide irritable service, the 'I couldn't care less' thing that many people notice with nurses and EMPLOYEES OF THE PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM. I write that last in caps because I know it's an oft overlooked reality by many in CA who are employed at taxpayer dollars that they may be teaching in public schools but they are still responsible, as is everyone else, to customer service. Unions encourage disregarding that.
The payment of union dues should be strictly optional.
Being discussed now on Al Rantel in Los Angeles --- www.kabc.com
Oh, backers. I thought it said hackers. Never mind.
As an example of the destructiveness of unions, The NEA, and other teachers unions, have all but destroyed the public school system of our country during the past 50 years. An uneducated public is a far greater danger to America than Muslim terror.
The singular objective of the NEA is to enrich the union leadership...nothing more or less. In order to accomplish this they need as many dues paying members as possible. They achhieve this as follows:
(1) convince the public (and use the democrat/MSM enforcing the notion) that the smallest number of students in a classroom is essential to learning....i.e. one student to one teacher would be ideal. This provides more members for them.
(2)Get support from the "teachers" by getting as much money for them as possible no matter what the public impact.
(3)Give lip service to helping children to keep the sham going.
So does anyone know if this happened?
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