CPS: Nearly 250 CTU members worked during April 1 strike

Some 247 Chicago Teachers Union members reported to work on April 1, bucking their own union, which had declared it a strike day, according to numbers provided by Chicago Public Schools Friday.

The bulk of them, 173, were teachers, CPS spokeswoman Emily Bittner said. She had no details of where those workers reported or how CPS counted them.

The CTU has policies in place for members it finds to be “strike breakers” after they’ve had due process. Penalties include suspension or expulsion from the union, as well as fines in the amount of pay collected while the rest of the union was on strike.

CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey pointed out that the union comprises 27,000 members, saying that “the vast, vast majority of them participated in the strike despite all (CPS CEO) Forrest Claypool’s threats and intimidation tactics.”

He continued, “If this is part of a conscious campaign on their part to make a point . . . that there’s a section of people who side with CPS against the CTU, I think that’s a pretty pitiful tactic on their part.”

He said the union counts dissenters based on reports other members submit about who they’ve seen at work on a strike day. Only a few of those names have come in so far, he said.

He also questioned how CPS arrived at 247 people, a detail the district didn’t explain Friday, wondering if any of those people getting paid were already on an approved leave.

“So I don’t really know what the number means,” he said, adding that “picket lines were extremely strong and there was a lot of unity around the city” that day.

But support for the one-day event that encompassed a wide variety of labor and social justice organizations wasn’t quite as strong as usual for the union that typically acts in lock-step. The vote among union delegates to authorize the strike was 486-124.

Several CTU members also told the Sun-Times that while they wouldn’t cross picket lines and go to work, nor would they join larger efforts across the city or downtown.

CPS Education Chief Janice Jackson promised that none of the striking teachers would be disciplined, just unpaid, if they didn’t go to work on April 1.

Sharkey said right before the April 1 citywide teacher’s strike, downtown rally and march that snarled the Loop, that “now isn’t the time for us to start planning what actions we’ll take against our co-workers,” he said.

“The most important thing is that April 1 is an official strike action,” sanctioned by 80 percent of a vote by the union’s governing body, Sharkey said at the time. “If someone chooses to work anyway, crossing the picket line is a serious offense in union principles in which they put their personal consideration over their co-workers.”

He added that the CTU has no power to take anyone’s money but requires the fines to reinstate membership.

During the CTU’s historic 2012 strike that lasted seven days, 19 members crossed picket lines and were declared strikebreakers, according to the CTU. CPS says about 100 members went to work.

Anyone suspended or kicked out of the CTU can still keep their CPS job, according to the district. Those people lose their voting power as union members but still have to pay dues, the union said.

CPS also is going after CTU for costs racked up during the strike as well as sanctions. The Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board will consider that case later this month.