How employees of a union strike . . . a union?
LYNDSEY TETER | The Other Paper
September 1, 2010
On Tuesday, Michele Prater, spokeswoman for the Ohio Education Association, was in a strange predicament: She couldn’t speak for the management.
Although that’s normally her full-time job, the media relations consultant couldn’t comment on a potential strike at her workplace. That’s because if a deal wasn’t struck between her bosses and her union representation, she would be out on the picket lines Wednesday morning. Prater is one of 109 employees represented by the Professional Staff Union (PSU) who exercised their right to strike against the OEA at midnight Tuesday.
So, if you’re keeping score at home, half the 220 employees who work at the Ohio Education Association, the state’s largest teacher’s union, just went on strike.
“It’s just plain embarrassing for us, and probably for many OEA members, that we have to be put in this situation of a union striking a union,” said Norm Young, president of PSU, in a written statement.
“Our PSU members have to deal regularly with difficult school boards and school administrators around the state. It’s as if OEA officers and administrators think they have to impersonate the worst of them in the way they treat us. It’s simply the rankest form of hypocrisy,” said Young.
But for an organization apparently embattled in a bitter feud with half its workers, the OEA’s higher-ups did not hit back. Hell, they didn’t even object to the charges.
Read the rest @ The Other Paper.
