Daily Newswire
National/Politics
Union President seeks to re-energize public servants (includes video)
Apr 02, 2013 8:11 PM EDT By Les Smith (FOX13)
As one of the most recognized leaders of the labor movement in America for more than 35 years, you might think Lee Saunders' zeal to advance the cause of the working man might have mellowed. You would be wrong. In his first full year as President of the 1.6 million member AFSCME Union, Saunders is determined to re-energize embattled public service workers nationwide. So, what better place to relive and rekindle the fires of past and present struggles than by coming to Memphis to commemorate the sacrifice of Dr. Martin Luther King on behalf of the famed sanitation workers' strike 45 years ago this week. ... Joining Saunders in town for a panel discussion and then the renaming of a city street in honor of the 13-hundred striking workers King came to help, will be his son Martin Luther King III and activist Al Sharpton. But, rather than solely dwelling on history, Saunders is ready to throw the full backing of his politically active union behind the current contract negotiating efforts of AFSCME local 1733 with the city. Saunders leveled a shot above the bow toward the man he and the city employee unions hold responsible for the controversial 4.6 percent pay cut that's sent them economically reeling.
Workers Dr. King Fought For Say Challenges Still Lie Ahead (includes video) WREG, 10:11 pm, April 2, 2013,
.... The national president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Lee Saunders, said that if Dr. King were alive, he would be in Memphis. Saunders noted the current struggle of city workers to reverse a 4.6 percent pay cut they received two years ago. AFSCME filed a lawsuit shortly after that pay cut, alleging the city had violated bargaining practices, sparked by the 1968 strike that brought Dr. King to Memphis. The actual ‘impasse ordinance’ in question was established in 1978 for all city workers. “We have a mayor who is not recognizing and not respecting the collective bargaining process,” Saunders said.
Relate: AP: Decades after Martin Luther King's death, Memphis jobs at risk
Commercial Appeal: Chad Johnson, Executive Director AFSCME Local 1733: Letter: History's voice fades
Obama Labor Pick’s Immigration Advocacy Tests Republicans
By Laura Litvan - Apr 3, 2013, Bloomberg
When Thomas Perez was nominated in 2009 to a top Justice Department post, Senate Republicans delayed a vote for months over his past work with a group that aids immigrants, regardless of their legal status. Perez returns to the Senate for a confirmation hearing April 18 as President Barack Obama’s pick to lead the Labor Department, the only Hispanic in his second-term Cabinet so far, this time posing a political challenge to the Republican Party. Republicans are seeking to woo Latino voters lost in 2012 by quelling their anti-immigration rhetoric, and some members are working with Democrats on a path to citizenship for an estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S.
ADP Data Shows U.S. Economy Added Fewer Jobs Than Forecast
By Michelle Jamrisko - Apr 3, 2013 8:37 AM ET, Bloomberg
Companies added fewer workers than projected in March, held back by limited hiring in construction, according to a private report based on payrolls. The 158,000 increase in employment was the smallest since October and followed a revised 237,000 gain the prior month, figures from the Roseland, New Jersey-based ADP Research Institute showed today. The median forecast of 39 economists surveyed by Bloomberg called for a 200,000 advance. “The job market continues to improve, but in fits and starts,” Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics Inc., said in a statement. Moody’s produces the figures with ADP.
GAO: 401(k) companies often mislead account holders
By Michael A. Fletcher, Washington Post: April 2
Money management firms frequently offer workers misleading and self-serving information about how to handle their retirement savings when they change jobs, according to a Government Accountability Office report to be released Wednesday. Departing workers are often encouraged to roll their accounts into individual retirement accounts, or IRAs, run by the firms that already manage their retirement money, even when it would be best for employees to keep the money in a 401(k), the GAO investigation concluded. Having workers move their money into IRAs typically allows money management companies to harvest bigger fees for handling the retirement money, the report said.
S&P Fires New Salvo in Battle With States
By JEANNETTE NEUMANN, Wall Street Journal, Updated April 2, 2013, 6:11 p.m. ET
Standard & Poor's Ratings Services said the Justice Department failed to tell a federal judge the "true" reason the U.S. government is supporting 17 state attorneys general in their lawsuits against the rating firm. In an eight-page filing Tuesday in U.S. District Court in Connecticut, the McGraw-Hill Cos. unit complained that Justice Department officials failed to tell the same judge in a filing last week that they have "actively collaborated with" the 17 states and are doing so "to this day." It was S&P's latest salvo in a legal battle that could wind up costing S&P billions of dollars if the firm loses the cases or settles them to cut its losses. .... Both the Justice Department and various states have sued S&P over ratings it issued before the financial crisis.
The really early 2016 line: Hillary, Biden look strong over potential GOP field
By David Lightman | McClatchy Newspapers, Tuesday, April 2, 2013
.... The survey matched Clinton, the former secretary of state, and Vice President Biden against four potential Republican challengers. The Democrats easily beat Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. Against New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, thought to be a long shot for the party’s presidential nomination, Clinton barely won and Biden barely lost.
Health groups say Medicare letter misrepresented views
By Sam Baker, The Hill, 04/02/13 02:36 PM ET
Allies of the pharmaceutical industry appear to have misrepresented the views of certain advocacy groups by listing them as supporters of a big lobbying push that they actually oppose. .... At issue is a routine-seeming letter spearheaded by RetireSafe, a nonprofit healthcare advocacy group funded in part by the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America, the main lobbying group for drugmakers. The letter, sent out last month, opposed calls to let Medicare negotiate the prices it pays for prescription drugs, and listed more than 300 patient and advocacy groups as opposing Medicare price negotiations. But a handful of those groups actually support Medicare price negotiations and said they had no idea they were being included on a letter to the contrary. .... The advocacy group Health Care for America Now (HCAN) said RetireSafe’s presence on the letter raised red flags
. For example, why did it include Occupy Baton Rouge, an offshoot of the decidedly anti-corporate Occupy Wall Street? “There are certain groups where we were incredulous they would actually sign the letter,” HCAN Executive Director Ethan Rome said. HCAN surveyed about 20 of the groups listed on the letter, five of which said they had not agreed to be included.
CMS reverses course on cuts
By: Brett Norman and Jennifer Haberkorn, Politico, April 3, 2013 04:49 AM EDT
The insurance industry chalked up one of its greatest political victories in recent memory on Monday as the Obama administration reversed course on a proposal to cut Medicare Advantage rates. After intense lobbying, the agency said Monday that it would change the proposed 2.3 percent cut to those plans to a 3.3 percent boost. That’s a significant swing worth billions of dollars to the industry next year alone. ... The health insurance lobby pulled out all the stops on this Medicare Advantage cut and proved that when it flexes its muscle, it’s a formidable force.
Obamacare credits could trigger surprise tax bills
By Stephen Ohlemacher, Associated Press | Associated Press, April 2, 2013
Millions of people who take advantage of government subsidies to help buy health insurance next year could get stung by surprise tax bills if they don't accurately project their income. President Barack Obama's new health care law will offer subsidies to help people buy private health insurance on state-based exchanges, if they don't already get coverage through their employers. The subsidies are based on income. The lower your income, the bigger the subsidy. But the government doesn't know how much money you're going to make next year. And when you apply for the subsidy, this fall, it won't even know how much you're making this year. So, unless you tell the government otherwise, it will rely on the best information it has: your 2012 tax return, filed this spring.
The case of the $1,206 toenail clipping
Ezra Klein, Washington Post, April 2, 2013 at 11:47 am
Last week I posted 21 charts showing the absurdly high prices Americans pay for health care. One reader wrote in with a story that is perhaps more compelling than any of them: ... The hospital did a single toenail clipping. The bill is $1,206. To avoid misunderstandings, this was not a surgical intervention. It was the same kind of clipping that you do yourself every week, except that only a small piece of only one nail was clipped.
Health Care: The New American Sadism
Charles Simic, New York Review of Books, April 2, 2013, 6:15 p.m.
... This is the new face of American sadism: the unconcealed burst of joy at the thought that pain is going to be inflicted on someone weak and helpless. Its viciousness, I believe, is symptomatic of the way our society is changing. Everything from the healthcare industry, payday loans, and for-profit prisons to the trading in so-called derivatives, privatization of public education, outsourcing of jobs, war profiteering, and hundreds of other ongoing rackets all have that same predatory quality.
Corporations getting cold feet on tax reform
By: Rachael Bade and Jonathan Allen, Politico, April 2, 2013 07:12 PM EDT
At first, it seemed like an idea the White House, Congress and corporate America could all agree on. Every company would play by the same tax rules: They would give up their special tax breaks in exchange for lowering the basic tax rate from 35 percent to as little as 25 percent. But with Congress starting to dig into the details, many captains of industry are backpedaling — and fast. The corporations aren’t keen on giving up the special tax breaks that have let many of them pay Uncle Sam less than advertised for years.
After Protests, Prison Firm Pulls Donation
By GREG BISHOP, New York Times, April 2, 2013
Sports stadiums have been named for fast food companies, office supply chains, and banks, but apparently there is one sector of the economy that is not welcome in the sports world: the private prison industry. Florida Atlantic University announced late Monday that the GEO Group Foundation, the charitable arm of the private prison corporation, planned to withdraw its $6 million gift for what was to be called GEO Group Stadium, citing discomfort at being drawn into a debate about civil rights and privatization. In a statement, GEO said that backing out of the deal was “in the best long-term interest of the university.”
NRA study suggests trained, armed school staffers
AP, April 2, 2013
With the Senate gun control debate on the near horizon, a National Rifle Association-sponsored report on Tuesday proposed a program for schools to train selected staff members as armed security officers...... Also denouncing the recommendations was Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, which represents 1.5 million teachers and other workers. She called it a “cruel hoax that will fail to keep our children and schools safe” while helping only gun manufacturers.
Public Schools, Private Agendas: Parent Revolution
by Gary Cohn on April 2, 2013, Frying Pan News
At first glance, it is one of the nation’s hottest new education-reform movements, a seemingly populist crusade to empower poor parents and fix failing public schools. But a closer examination reveals that the “parent-trigger” movement is being heavily financed by the conservative Walton Family Foundation, one of the nation’s largest and most strident anti-union organizations, a Frying Pan News investigation has shown. .... “Everything the Walton foundation has done over the years is to support privatization and anti-union policies,” Diane Ravitch, an education historian and former Assistant Secretary of Education under President George H.W. Bush, tells Frying Pan News.
Retailers Track Employee Thefts in Vast Databases
By STEPHANIE CLIFFORD and JESSICA SILVER-GREENBERG, New York Times, April 2, 2013
Facing a wave of employee theft, retailers across the country have helped amass vast databases of workers accused of stealing and are using that information to keep employees from working again in the industry. ... But the databases, which are legal, are facing scrutiny from labor lawyers and federal regulators, who worry they are so sweeping that innocent employees can be harmed. The lawyers say workers are often coerced into confessing, sometimes when they have done nothing wrong, without understanding that they will be branded as thieves.
SEC Embraces Social Media / New Way to Make Disclosures Gets Go-Ahead if Investors Are Told Where to Look
By JESSICA HOLZER and GREG BENSINGER, Wall Street Journal, April 2, 2013, 7:49 p.m. ET
Executives with itchy Twitter fingers can rest easier after federal securities regulators blessed the use of social-media sites to broadcast market-moving corporate news. The Securities and Exchange Commission cleared Netflix CEO Reed Hastings of any wrongdoing in using social media platforms to disseminate corporate information. Paul Vigna reports. In a ruling that portends changes to how companies communicate with investors, the Securities and Exchange Commission said Tuesday that postings on sites such as Facebook and Twitter are just as good as news releases and company websites as long as the companies have told investors which outlets they intend to use.
AFSCME Family Scholarship Program Winners Announced
BY CLYDE WEISS | APRIL 03, 2013, AFSCME blog
Ten high school seniors – dependents of AFSCME members – will receive financial support for college through this year’s AFSCME Family Scholarship Program.
State/Local
AZ: Judge Rules in Favor of AZ Labor Unions / Ruling: Restrictions are unconstitutional
(Ted Houston, KFYI News) April 3, 2013
A federal judge has declared two bills passed by the Arizona legislature in 2011, regulating the behavior of labor unions, unconstitutional. Senate Bill 1365 required employee consent before their employer could deduct money from their paychecks for "political purposes" including lobbying. Judge Murray Snow found the law was unconstitutional because it exempted public safety unions, which the bill's sponsor, former Republican Sen. Frank Antenori, said he had done because public safety unions told him they operate differently from most other unions. SB 1365 never took effect because it was put on hold due to the lawsuit against it. The other measure, SB 1363, limited picketing by striking workers. Judge Snow ruled that the law limited free speech.
CA: San Jose, other cities, find it easier to cut retiree health perks than pensions
By John Woolfolk, mercurynews.com 04/03/2013 06:16:24 AM PDT
While San Jose battles unions in court to enact pension cuts voters approved in a nationally watched June ballot measure, the city is already deflating its ballooning retirement bill with an unheralded move to shrink health benefits. The fate of San Jose's Measure B pension reforms remains uncertain -- a Santa Clara County Superior Court trial is scheduled June 17 with appeals expected. But like a host of other local governments, San Jose is finding health insurance a quicker path toward trimming retirement perks that are more generous than those in private industry, and whose growing costs have devoured funds for staffing and services.
CT: Labor Relations Director Steps Down
BY Melissa Bailey | APR 2, 2013 8:16 AM, New Haven Independent
....... Dugas said he has also come to an agreement with AFSCME Council 4 Local 3144 on the bulk of a new contract for city managers. The two sides have agreed on everything, “except for three issues that are going to arbitration,” he said.
FL: ‘A sin to underpay’: Church leaders back UM food workers on union
NADEGE GREEN AND MARGAUX HERRERA, MIAMIHERALD.COM, April 2, 2013
A dozen ministers and church leaders gathered at the University of Miami on Tuesday to demand fair wages for the university’s food service workers. The employees work for Chartwells, the company in charge of the dining halls and most food service at UM. Some employees earn less than $10,000 a year and supplement their income with government aid, said Muhammed Malik, one of the protest organizers. ... The pastors on Tuesday said they will continue to raise awareness about the food service workers fight to form a union. A Facebook fan page has been set up under WeCaneDoBetter to tell the food service workers’ stories.
HI: Arbitration awards state nurses an 8% pay raise
KITV, 2:04 PM HST Apr 02, 2013
An arbitration decision came in Monday for state nurses with the Hawaii Government Employees Association's Unit 9. With arbitration now settled, HGEA Unit 9 can begin negotiating a new contract, that would begin July 1. HGEA's Unit 9, which is made up of state nurses, was the only unit not to settle in 2011. In a heated exchange caught on video between Gov. Neil Abercrombie and some Maui nurses in May 2011, Abercrombie got riled explaining how without the Legislature's approval of his budget package, there was no money for public sector nurses.
IA: Update: Inmate attacks officer at Newton prison; union head, administration, issue statements
Newton Independent, April 2, 2013
An attack on a guard at the Newton prison today was the result of the state shortchanging prison operations the head of the union representing state correctional officers said today, while administration official say the cause of the attack remains under investigation. "Today, a correctional officer was repeatedly punched in the face by an inmate at the Newton Correctional Facility," AFSCME Iowa Council 61 President Danny Homan said in a statement issued today.
IL: Want to fix Illinois? Big Jim says you've got to do this first
James Thompson is senior chairman of Chicago law firm Winston & Strawn. He was governor of Illinois from 1977 to 1991. Crain’s, April 03, 2013
On March 14, former Illinois Gov. James Thompson spoke at a gathering of the World Presidents' Organization in Chicago and urged the business leaders there to get active in the push to fix the state's pension and budget problems. Mr. Thompson provided Crain's a transcript of his remarks; the following is an excerpted version: .... We also have to stop demonizing public employees. We would not have a decent business climate without good, honest, hardworking public employees. We have to get away from the idea that they are the enemy. They are not the enemy. We need to make them our allies. And I'll add one more: We need to stop demonizing unions. You can disagree with AFSCME, you can disagree with the teachers, you can disagree with other public employee unions without demonizing unions as some who want to be governor are wont to do.
IN: Gary airport privatization idea not new
Keith Benman nwi.com, April 3, 2013
A joint city/airport committee readying a recommendation on privatization at Gary/Chicago International Airport is not the first effort to find private investors to spur airport development. Almost five years ago, then-mayor Rudy Clay said he had been approached by private investment bankers interested in a public-private partnership at the airport and he began talking up the prospect. The next year, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels told the conservative American Enterprise Institute that leasing the airport to a private operator represented "a heck of an opportunity." It was Daniels who engineered the $3.8 billion lease of the Indiana Toll Road in 2006. But not everyone thought the idea could work.
Indiana could be first to require armed employee in every public school
Apr 3, 2013 Chris Sikich and Stephanie Wang Indianapolis Star
Indiana could become the first state in the nation to require an employee in every public or charter school to carry a loaded gun during school hours — a response to fears about mass school shootings. Legislation approved Tuesday by the House Education Committee would mandate the creation of a protection officer for each school. With proper training, those officers could be principals, teachers, staff members, police officers or security guards.
MI: Detroit City Council can meet, but Orr must approve actions
April 3, 2013 | By Joe Guillen, Detroit Free Press
.... The council met Tuesday as scheduled -- with Orr's blessing -- the day after labor activist Robert Davis filed a lawsuit in Wayne County Circuit Court, asking a judge to stop the body from meeting. Davis said an emergency manager appointment removes authority from the council to meet, deliberate or spend city funds. ... Davis, who works for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, has filed several legal challenges to the application of emergency managers in Detroit and the Highland Park Schools, lawsuits frequently rebuffed in appellate courts. He is the subject of a federal investigation and was indicted last year on charges he pocketed more than $125,000 from the Highland Park district by submitting false invoices for advertising.
MI: Saginaw County is First in Michigan to Bond for Pension Liability
by: CAITLIN DEVITT, Bond Buyer, Tuesday, April 2, 2013
Saginaw County is set to become the first local government in Michigan to issue bonds to cover its unfunded pension liability when it comes to market this month with up to $75 million of taxable debt. The county will become the first in the state to take advantage of a new law that allows qualified local governments to issue long-term bonds to cover their retiree obligations. Governments can also borrow to cover their other post-employment benefits, or OPEBs, under the new law.
MI: Teamsters weigh unfair labor charge
Apr 2, 2013 | Holly Setter, Times Herald
Teamsters Local 214 is on the verge of filing an unfair labor practices complaint against St. Clair County regarding contract negotiations for the juvenile detention officers. ... If it is, it will be the second unfair labor practices complaint against the county in nine years. The other was filed just last year by AFSCME 1518, which represents district court employees, said Jennifer Grace, human resources director for the county.
MN: Cass board approves union contracts
April 2, 2013 - 7:23pm By Monica Lundquist, Brainerd Dispatch
Cass County Board Tuesday approved all but one of the county’s two-year union contracts and approved the same terms for elected officials other than the board and for non-union employees. Negotiations are still in progress for the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) bargain unit representing health, human and veterans services employees. ... Union contacts approved Tuesday include the following: AFSCME unit representing courthouse employees, Operating Engineers 49 representing highway employees and Teamsters 346 unit representing dispatchers and records personnel. ... The wage portion of the contracts calls for a 2.5 percent raise for the pay scale effective Jan. 1, 2013, and another 2.5 percent raise for the pay scale effective Jan. 1, 2014.
NH: Concord school administrators consider privatizing food services
By KATHLEEN RONAYNE, Monitor, April 3, 2013
The Concord School District is exploring the possible benefits of privatizing its food services, a move that is drawing sharp criticism from employees even in its early stages. .... A private company, such as Cafe Services or Chartwells, may have more money and better resources to comply with new federal regulations on lunch offerings and for marketing and education.
NM: State workers to see hike in health premiums
Wed Apr 3, 2013. By Steve Terrell, The New Mexican
State employees might get a 1 percent pay raise this year, depending on what Gov. Susana Martinez decides to do about the budget bill by the end of the week. However, even if that modest raise comes through, part of it will be eaten up by a 15 percent hike in health insurance premiums for state workers, scheduled to go into effect in July.
NV: State workers to say bye-bye to furloughs in July 2014
By Andrew Doughman, Las Vegas Sun, Tuesday, April 2, 2013 | 12:45 p.m.
State employees will no longer have to take unpaid furlough days, starting in July 2014, Gov. Brian Sandoval said. The governor’s original budget provided for decreasing furlough days from six to three per year for the next two years. Now, Sandoval’s $12 million plan calls for three furlough days between July 1 and June 30, 2014, and no furlough days between July 1, 2014, and June 30, 2015.
NY: Public-sector workers face tough road ahead
By Rick Karlin, Times Union, Wednesday, April 3, 2013
State workers avoided potential potholes in the newly enacted budget, but several hundred public sector employees in the Capitol Region are facing at a tough road ahead. Barring a last-minute breakthrough, about 200 state Thruway employees will be out of work after Wednesday. The final number of toll takers, maintenance hands and clerical workers who will be laid off is slightly less than the 243 layoffs announced earlier in the year because some have retired in the interim. .... The Thruway Authority has retained Joe Bress, a negotiator who in 2011 helped hammer out contracts between the state agencies and two major unions, the Public Employees Federation and Civil Service Employees Association, both of which represent a handful of Thruway workers.
NY: County offer to take over police dispatch creates worries
Dale White Tuesday, April 2, 2013 at 1:56 p.m., Herald Tribune
As part of its plans for a new emergency response center, Sarasota County is offering to take over dispatch duties for the Venice, North Port and Longboat Key police departments. The consolidation could save money. And it would streamline service. Currently, calls from the smaller cities first go to the Sheriff's Office, then are transferred to Venice, North Port and Longboat Key dispatchers. .... Dan Tucci, president of the Venice chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, says the municipalities will save money by eliminating dispatcher jobs. Yet the cost may just be shifted to taxpayers countywide instead. “Nothing's for free,” Tucci said. “It may be no charge to the city but somebody's got to pay.”
NY: Supervisors consider privatizing Pine Haven
Wednesday, April 3, 2013 12:30 am By Nathan Mayberg Hudson-Catskill Newspapers
The Columbia County Board of Supervisors are considering privatizing the Pine Haven Nursing and Rehabilitation Center. ... Supervisor Art Baer, NOP-Hillsdale, said there is a philosophical question about dealing with the county’s safety net population. “Once it becomes privatized, the safety net is diluted,” Baer said.
NY: Standing room only crowd largely criticizes plan to privatize Albany County Nursing Home
Wednesday, April 03, 2013 By Jamie D. Gilkey, The Record
For nearly four hours Albany County lawmakers spent their Tuesday evening listening to a parade of witnesses who discussed the fate of the county’s nursing home. The lengthy gabfest was attended by a standing room only crowd that loudly cheered critics of County Executive Dan McCoy’s plan to lease the facility to a private operator while giving a lukewarm response to supporters of the proposal. During the meeting two speakers even noted that all but one supporter of the proposed operator, Upstate Services Group, are employees of the company.
OR: Unions call for banks to repay PERS funds
Apr 3, 2013 | Statesman Journal
Union members flooded a public hearing, many of them wearing suits with stickers saying “Banker: I wrecked the economy,” and carrying briefcases and pockets full of fake money. Too-green $100 bills trailed down the hallway to the House wing, where the budget subcommittee on general government crowded a packed house into a tiny hearing room. The crowd Tuesday overflowed to larger rooms down the hall, and only six people testified, but the message from the Service Employees International Union Local 503 was clear: Go after the banks, not our retirements.
Puerto Rico Pension Reform Advances
by: ROBERT SLAVIN, Bond Buyer, Tuesday, April 2, 2013
The Puerto Rico House of Representatives and Senate have approved separate bills to reform the commonwealth’s main government pension plan. The bills address the Employees Retirement System, which has only 6 cents for every dollar actuarially required. Monday night’s actions were on bills that largely mirrored García Padilla’s proposed reforms, an administration official said.
TN: Crucible of Change in Memphis as State Takes On Failing Schools
By MOTOKO RICH, New York Times, April 2, 2013
.... Last fall, Tennessee began removing schools with the lowest student test scores and graduation rates from the oversight of local school boards and pooling them in a special state-run district. Memphis, where the vast majority of public school students are black and from poor families, is ground zero: 80 percent of the bottom-ranked schools in the state are here. Tennessee’s Achievement School District, founded as part of the state’s effort to qualify for the Obama administration’s Race to the Top grant, is one of a small handful of state-run districts intended to rejuvenate chronically struggling schools. ... Most of the schools will be run by charter operators. All will emphasize frequent testing and data analysis. Many are instituting performance pay for teachers and longer school days, and about a fifth of the new district’s recruits come from Teach for America, a program in which high-achieving college graduates work in low-income neighborhood schools. And the achievement district will not offer teachers tenure.
VT: Bill would force nonunion Vt. teachers to pay dues
Apr 02, 2013 7:51 PM By Kyle Midura, WCAX
Tuesday, the Vermont House Committee on General, Housing and Military Affairs began work on the first bill passed by the Senate this session. S.14 would require union nonmembers to pay a large percentage of regular dues when covered by a bargaining unit.
WI: Job slump is Walker's fault
Jack Norman, former research director at the Institute for Wisconsin's Future. April 1, 2013, Journal Sentinel
Yes, it's totally appropriate to blame the governor's policies for the slumbering condition of Wisconsin's economy. Here's why. ... Nationally, the number of private-sector jobs has been growing about 2% a year. In Wisconsin, it's only about 1% a year. The gap began when Scott Walker took office in January 2011 and widened when his policies took effect that July. .... We correctly predicted Wisconsin's slump based on economic reasoning, not on political ideology. For example, Walker's Act 10, which took effect in July 2011, sharply reduced the take-home pay for almost all of the state's 350,000 public employees. A typical state employee earning $50,000 lost $4,228 in take-home pay, according to the Wisconsin Legislative Fiscal Bureau. That's money drained out of the state's economy.
WI: Milwaukee voters overwhelmingly back retaining same-day voter registration
By Don Walker of the Journal Sentinel April 2, 2013
Voters in Milwaukee overwhelmingly approved an advisory referendum Tuesday that backs the right to register at the polls on election day. With 97% of the units reporting, the measure was winning 73%-27%. ... Before Tuesday's vote, proponents of same-day voting were hoping for a large turnout and victory margin as a means of sending a message to Republican legislators not to fiddle with the law.
