As city launches website in battle with teachers, union pushes to livestream contract talks

As Mayor Lori Lightfoot announced a new website to help win over the public in her quest to head off a teachers strike, the union responded with its own proposal to shine more light on the process by livestreaming bargaining.

Lightfoot’s website, at cps.edu/ouroffer, will lay out the city’s stances and proposals on various issues in an attempt to convince residents that she’s taking the right position by not budging on teachers’ demands.

“We put, I think, a very fulsome offer on the table,” the mayor told reporters Monday. “That’s real money, and there’s no reason why we shouldn’t get a deal done.”

Asked if she’s worried about losing a public relations battle as the CTU nears a possible strike, Lightfoot said: ”No, what I’m worried about is making sure that our kids actually have a healthy and safe nurturing environment. And I think we have put offers on the table that further that important obligation and mission.”

The CTU, meanwhile, responded with a request to broadcast live the actual bargaining sessions, which will increase to four times a week starting Tuesday.

”This new website does not replace open bargaining, which we’d still like to see,” CTU President Jesse Sharkey said in a news release. “Those who are most impacted — including more than 25,000 teachers, paraprofessionals and clinicians and the families they serve — deserve a seat at the table, and livestreaming bargaining would be a step towards that.”

The union and city have been in contract negotiations since January but have heated up their rhetoric over the past few weeks.

CTU members voted by a wide margin last week in favor of a strike that would be the union’s first since a seven-day walkout in 2012. The union’s House of Delegates is expected to set a strike date at its meeting Wednesday, though the earliest teachers could walk out is Oct. 7.