Los Angeles teachers denounce UTLA betrayal of strike
By
our reporters
23 January 2019
The conspiracy by United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) and the Democratic Party to ram through a new contract to end the six-day strike by 33,000 educators provoked widespread anger from teachers.
Teachers were given only a few hours to read the 40-page agreement before they were forced to vote on the deal later in the evening. Prior to that, the union and the district officials had been engaged in closed-door negotiations for five days during which time no details were revealed to teachers.
The fraudulent character of the voting process was made clear in comments Tuesday morning during the press conference announcing the deal. Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti along with Los Angeles Unified School District Superintendent Austin Beutner and UTLA President Alex Caputo-Pearl all announced that the strike was over before a single vote was even cast.
Underscoring its contempt for rank-and-file teachers, Caputo-Pearl announced that “a supermajority had liked the deal” and voted for it even though mass teacher sentiment has been overwhelmingly against the deal. Referring to this opposition, the UTLA president added, “I don’t begrudge anyone who had higher expectations. That’s why the struggle continues.”
Typical were responses like this one from a teacher posting on Facebook, “We knew something was wrong when you held the pep rally and issued a joint statement that the strike was over before we even saw the TA [Tentative Agreement]. When it was released, we just had a few hours to review before voting. You rushed this process after a weekend of secret meetings and it shows.”
Another teacher wrote on Facebook, “So many teachers couldn’t vote, but not…