So, the crux of this story is that a lady in Oregon, as part of her job as director of the local Chamber of Commerce, got up at a School Board Meeting and read a statement urging teachers to accept a pay package that they had been battling over for 11 months. The Teachers Union didn’t like here statement, flexed their muscle, and had the lady fired from her job at a local credit union.
( The Redstate article that brought this to my attention is a little long, so I’ve summarized it below. But if you want to check it out for verificaiton, the link is HERE: )
Below is the heart of her statement. You read it and tell me: Do we want Public Employee Unions to have the power to get a person fired for exercising their 1st Amendment rights and simply voicing an opinion like this at a public government meeting?
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“The district should not spend any additional money towards teacher salary and/or benefits if doing so will require the district to reduce teaching positions and increase classroom sizes to pay for them in order to meet its budget. We should hope the union would see the benefit of smaller class sizes on their members workload and student performance but to date, they have continued to insist on additional wage and benefit increases even though the district indicates that such demands could mean the loss of as many as 40+ teaching positions.”
“We know many business people, concerned citizens and parents in our community feel, as we do, that they support teachers and appreciate what they do. We do not want to be perceived as opposing teachers and/or education but want to stand up to the unreasonable demands of the teacher’s union given the current state, local and national economic conditions.”
“We believe this has long-term community and business consequences. The Chamber and many of its member businesses have supported local education, including the $68 million bond measure that updated and expanded many of our educational facilities. Although we opposed Measures 66 and 67 last year, they passed and have not live up to the challenge of fixing the funding crisis. Our fear is that failure to hold the line on expenses will result in new calls for business taxes at a time when both the business community and the local economy cannot afford it. We urge that your voice be heard on this issue and we intend to share it.”
“Please let us know how you feel about this issue.”
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