Posted: Sunday, Sept. 16, 2012
Statement from Mayor Rahm Emanuel on the Chicago Teacher’s Union
Choice to Continue to Strike:
"I will not stand by while the children of Chicago are played as pawns in an
internal dispute within a union. This was a strike of choice and is now a delay
of choice that is wrong for our children. Every day our kids are kept out of
school is one more day we fail in our mission: to ensure that every child in
every community has an education that matches their potential.
I have instructed the City's Corporation Counsel to work with the General
Counsel of Chicago Public Schools to file an injunction in circuit court to
immediately end this strike and get our children back in the classroom. This
continued action by union leadership is illegal on two grounds – it is over
issues that are deemed by state law to be non-strikable, and it endangers the
health and safety of our children.
I have also asked the President of the Board of Education, David Vitale, and
the CEO of Chicago Public Schools, Jean-Claude Brizard, to explore every action
possible to get our kids back into a classroom or educational
facility.
While the union works through its remaining issues, there is no reason why the
children of Chicago should not be back in the classroom as they had been for
weeks while negotiators worked through these same issues."
Feedback: Contact the reporter via Twitter or leave a comment below.