CSA Files For Arbitration For Stalled Contract

By HOWARD MEGDAL

The union representing Principals, Assistant Principals and other administrators has filed for fact-finding with the state's Public Employment Relations Board, six months after seeking a declaration of a bargaining impasse in stalled contract talks with the city.

JILL LEVY: DOE not serious about a deal.

"It is clear to us that the [Department of Education] is not going to participate fully in the mediation process," Council of School Supervisors and Administrators President Jill S. Levy said in a letter to members. "Therefore, we are filing for fact-finding with the hope that the process will result in substantial recommendations for resolving this unending contract negotiation."

A fact-finding panel's recommendations will not be binding, but are likely to offer a framework for an eventual deal.

Meetings Unproductive

Since the union filed for impasse, CSA and DOE have had 14 in-person bargaining sessions and 12 phone sessions, along with several meetings with a PERB-appointed mediator. The CSA members have been working under an expired contract since July 1, 2003.

"We're still always hopeful that we'll be able to resolve it," Labor Commissioner James F. Hanley said in an Oct. 13 interview.

CSA Executive Vice President Ernest Logan weighed in on the decision, saying that "CSA members tell us that the Chancellor has told them that he wants to give them what he gave the teachers, that he wants to resolve the contract, and that he wants to make the new contract retroactive. We know we can settle this right now. But the Chancellor keeps demanding that we sell out our members' rights, rights

that are in place to prevent capricious and arbitrary terminations. And that's something we will never do."