Fred Klonsky | Daily posts from a retired public school teacher who is just looking at the data.:
Fred Klonsky | Running for our pensions. | VOTE 4 Fred Klonsky.
Why am I not surprised? The Tribune’s Eric Zorn is happy with the “balding white guy.”
In case you are one of the millions who don’t read the Chicago Tribune, Eric Zorn is their star columnist. A few years back he got into a sparring match with my blogger pal Glen Brown over pensions. It was like Jerry Quarry in the ring with Muhammad Ali. When Glen mentioned the pension protection clause of the Illinois Constitution, Zorn admitted he didn’t know anything about all that. Boom! Do
Will the Zombie Lovers, Quinn and Vallas, run based on Illinois spending the least on education of any state?
I told the lady that Illinois spends less on public schools than any other state in the United States. “Impossible.” “It’s true.” “Less than Mississippi,” she asked? “Less than Mississippi,” I answered. “How will cutting pension fix that?” “It won’t,” I said. “It’s not a pension problem. It’s a revenue problem.” The movement to switch Illinois from a flat tax to a more graduated “fair” tax is ga
The story is that members of the General Assembly are being asked to pencil in December 5th for a special session to deal with any pension proposal coming from the Gang of Ten. Excuse me if I am skeptical. I’m pretty sure a December 5th vote would still require a super majority to pass anything. The new regular session is in January. Some lawmakers say they aren’t pushing for a December special se
Saturday coffee.
Jim Fennerty of the National Lawyers Guild. Illinois teachers are still shaking their heads over Squeezy’s choice of Paul Vallas as his running mate. One teacher friend wrote saying it was enough to make her pull a Republican ballot in the primary to vote against Rauner. She was convinced a Quinn/Vallas combo could not win in November against Rauner and is terrified that Rauner would win. This
The in box. Medicare Advantage retiree meeting in Buffalo Grove.
Fred, Senator Julie Morrison called late this afternoon to announce that a timely meeting for the purpose of presenting information about the State of Illinois Medicare Advantage Plans has been scheduled in our area. Both Central Management Services (CMS) and United Healthcare will participate. The meeting is a week from tomorrow in Buffalo Grove (please see below). Please help to get the word
Paul Vallas. We don’t want nobody sent.
Illinois’ Bizarro World politics. “We don’t want nobody nobody sent,” is the old Chicago Democratic Machine response to newcomers who are trying to get their foot in the door for a job or political office. It means, “Get lost.” Paul Vallas is no newcomer to Illinois. Before Arne Duncan there was Paul Vallas. But we don’t want nobody sent. I thought the speculation that Squeezy would pick Linda
I’m wrong. Quinn goes with Vallas as his running mate.
Paul Vallas as Squeezy’s running mate. My prediction earlier today that Quinn would pick Representative Linda Chapa LaVia was wrong, continuing my poor record of political prognostication. Rich Miller at CapitalFax says it is Paul Vallas. Vallas faced a problematic job future in Bridgeport, Connecticut where he is superintendent of schools. The Connecticut courts are considering whether he is q
Chapa LaVia as Quinn’s running mate. An open House seat in Aurora.
Northern Illinois Jobs With Justice is active in Chapa LaVia’s Aurora House district. What state political race could I not possibly care less about? The office of Lieutenant Governor. It is an office that only becomes important once the Governor of Illinois goes to federal prison. Which, as we know, happens often. So maybe I should care who is running. The current Governor Squeezy was Rod Blagoj
A pro-pension state rep in Aurora? Will Chapa LaVia’s House seat may open up.
Northern Illinois Jobs With Justice is active in Chapa LaVia’s Aurora House district. What state political race could I not possibly care less about? The office of Lieutenant Governor. It is an office that only becomes important once the Governor of Illinois goes to federal prison. Which, as we know, happens often. So maybe I should care who is running. The current Governor Squeezy was Rod Blagoj
Who is Bruce Rauner?
Ever since I posted about Bruce Rauner, who is running for the Republican nomination for governor of Illinois, I have been getting emails from Jon Zahm and links to his an anti-Rauner conservative web site. Zahm is convinced that Rauner is a RINO – a Republican in name only. And who can blame him? However, the actual problem is that Illinois Democrats and Republicans are hard to tell apart. Sure.
NOV 07
Wishing Diane a speedy recovery.
Bad News from Me Dear Friends, I wanted to share some not very good news about my health. This week, my hyperactivity and age caught up with me. It turns out I am not Wonder Woman but mortal me. I have been in a hospital for teo days in Brooklyn, where they determined I have blood clots in one leg and walking pneumonia. Doctors’ orders: rest. That means I cannot fly to Chicago or Madison this wee
The in box. Ingram meeting provides little in the way of answers to our Medicare Advantage questions.
Fred, I talked with two friends who attended yesterday’s meeting at Andrew High School in Tinley Park that was hosted by Dick Ingram. According to my friends, the place was packed to the max. They were both frustrated by the inability to get answers to some general concerns and specific questions. They were encouraged to contact CMS for those issues even though several other people stated at the
Illinois veto session ends. No pension action. But retiree health insurance remains a confusing mess.
The Illinois General Assembly adjourned today taking no action on pensions. Here is the IEA statement: End of session report – Nov. 7, 2013 November 7, 2013 By IEA Government Relations Legislative Update – Nov 7 2013 Lawmakers have adjourned and are not scheduled to return to Springfield this year. IEA Director of Government Relations Jim Reed reports that while no pension bills impacting IEA me
Note to IEA Retired members on voting.
When casting your IEA Retired ballot be careful to follow the directions exactly. Otherwise your vote will be discarded. After marking the ballot it must be placed in the smaller envelope that has the directions but no name on it. Place that envelope in the one marked, IEA RA RETIRED DELEGATE BALLOT RETURN ENVELOPE. IEA does this so that who you vote for will remain a secret once the smaller envel
Know your fingerprinted: Peggy Critchfield.
Peggy Critchfield, President of Accurate Biometrics. A little more about the $650,000 contract that CPS, allegedly without bothering with board approval, gave to Accurate Biometrics. Accurate Biometrics will set up four locations where every CPS parent volunteer will be required to go to get fingerprinted. A condition of the contract with Accurate Biometrics is that they will hold all the data
Running for our pensions.
Trying to get recognized at an IEA Representative Assembly. I’ve never campaigned to be a delegate to the IEA Representative Assembly before, although I have been a delegate for all but one of the last twenty or so. My old local, the Park Ridge Education Association, could send five delegates. And frankly it was good if most years we had five people willing to spend three days in a large hotel co
Life in Rahm’s Chicago. Every CPS parent volunteer will be fingerprinted.
Data driven? All the research suggests that the greater the parental involvement in their children’s school the better the students perform. So CPS is requiring every parent school volunteer to be fingerprinted. And local neighborhood parents will need to travel to one of four distant locations to go through the fingerprinting process. Accurate Biometrics will be paid $650,000 a year through 2014
NOV 06
Is another public employee pension going down?
There is just a few more hours and a day in the Illinois veto session. Most observers are now predicting that no action will happen on pensions But that isn’t exactly true. Greg Hinz is reporting that a bill is about to pass the General Assembly that significantly impacts employees of the Chicago Park District. Apparently it has the support of both management and the union. Under the amendment fil
The in box. Jose Vilson on the De Blasio win.
Read the entire post on Jose Vilson’s blog. Voting, as simple as it seems, is not enough. It never was. When I see the history of suffrage, especially as it pertains to people of color and women, I see a struggle to get the opportunity to vote for the right candidate as conscious citizens should. I also see movements that didn’t stop at the legislative house. Whatever your particular brand of act
All Chicago kids deserve a quality Arts education.
We protested the closing of Lafayette last May. Photo: Fred Klonsky They closed Lafayette in August as part of Rahm’s 50-school massacre. By the way, Lafayette had a wonderful Arts program that served neighborhood kids. CPS swore that no charter school would replace Lafayette. However. late last week word leaked that ChiArts, a technically a contract school that focuses on the visual and perfor
Bridgeport voters fire Paul Vallas.
Bridgeport, Connecticut school superintendent, Paul Vallas. Before Arne Duncan there was Paul Vallas. When Chicago’s Mayor Richard Daley the second was handed mayoral control of the public schools, he handed them over to Paul Vallas. When Vallas’ vision of corporate reform went south, so did he. He was hired to run the charterization and teacher union busting of post Hurricane Katrina New Orlea
NOV 05
CMS admits post-December first meetings are “problematic.”
I spoke with a reader today about a phone conversation she had with Central Management Services. She wanted to know from CMS why there were so few information meetings scheduled for the north Chicago suburbs with facts about the switch to Medicare Advantage. This is the area with among the highest concentration of retired teachers in the state. I’ve posted before about how few there are and how la
Illinois’ CMS: “Can’t manage s**t.”
Here’s the latest information from Central Management Services regarding retiree health insurance: Total Retiree Advantage Illinois (TRAIL) The enrollment period for the Medicare Advantage plans has been set for November 12 through December 13, 2013. The effective date of the new plan will be February 1, 2014. Retirees who fail to select and complete enrollment in one of the Medicare Advantage pl
NOV 04
IEA Retired RA delegate ballots are in the mail. Keep an eye on your mailbox.
According to IEA election rules, over 9,000 ballots are in the mail to members of IEA Retired. We will be electing 18 at-large delegates and one ethnic minority delegate to the IEA Representative Assembly. Ballots must be mailed back and received by Springfield no later than December 11th. Rarely are there more than 2,000 ballots returned. Perhaps that is why IEA leadership gives little attention
Bob Lyons. “Not this week, but later.”
Bob Lyons is one of two members of the TRS board of trustees representing retirees. He writes: I can tell you, now that it has been reported in the press, that the four legislative leaders have agreed in principle to a pension reduction plan that has gone to the system actuaries to total up the full “savings “ to the state. Their goal was to arrive at a reduction number greater than the Culle
November Illinois veto session. Pensions again?
House Speaker Michael Madigan. Like the Cubs winning the World Series in 2014, it could happen. But probably not. The Illinois General Assembly will meet this week in veto session. They are not likely to meet again until the next regular session in January. And they are unlikely to pass a pension bill. Good news and bad news. The good news is that we still will receive the pension that is owed
The in box. “It seems to me that organizations like the IRTA, IEA and CTU should be putting energy and money into the campaign of Mr.Guzzardi.”
Fred, It seems to me that organizations like the IRTA, IEA and CTU should be putting energy and money into the campaign of Mr.Guzzardi. Supporting candidates like this would be a message to Mr. Madigan and others that educators have a voice, a substantial one at that. It appears that our political investments do not always line up with our political interests. I’m unsure how these decisions are ev
NOV 03
Sunday reads.
Chris Christie is a bully. The Jersey Jazzman interviews the teacher who had the nerve to challenge New Jersey Governor Chris Christie with the truth. What is behind those sky-high charter salaries. Nice work if you can get it. Common Core. “Consider the source.” Consider it indeed: UNO’s Juan Rangel? No shock here. Illinois legislators about to hand over millions of dollars to Archer Daniels M
NOV 02
The in box. “How can you be an advocate and not be an activist?”
The following appeared in the November newsletter of the North Lake Shore Illinois Retired Teachers Association. Irene Jinks is the unit president. 40.644923 -73.959265
Chicago students speak out against military school.
Logan Square’s Ames Middle School has been targeted for closing. The local alderman and the Mayor wanted it turned into a military academy. The community wasn’t consulted. In recent days the word has been that the militarization of Ames would continue. Then it wouldn’t. On again. Off again. One thing is certain. The students say no.
Keeping retirement weird.
Cyrus works for the National Park Service at the African Burial Grounds in lower Manhattan. Halloween seemed like the perfect reason to spend a few days in New York. Anne and I have never done Halloween with Lucy and Joey. Lucy is now ten years old. How many more chances would there be to knock on Brooklyn doors with the both of them? Lucy will be a teen-ager soon enough. She will likely have no