ESP VICE PRESIDENT
DE PERE SUPPORT STAFF VICE PRESIDENCY POSITION HAS BEEN FILLED. SUE S**** WILL BE THE ACTING VICE PRESIDENT UNTIL THE SPRING ELECTION.
JUST A REMINDER – IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN RUNNING FOR THIS POSITION QUALIFICATIONS ARE A MAJOR CONSIDERATION. YOU MUST BE INVOLVED IN THE UNION AND HAVE AN INTEREST IN THE UNION.
Knowing that there was at least one other candidate that expressed interest in the position, I wrote an email to our president and included a voicemail directly from this candidate.
J*****,
We went over the bylaws last summer. Did it not state that the only qualifications to be an officer is to be a member?
Article V, Section 2- Qualifications for Office
"Each candidate for office shall be an active member of the De Pere Educational Support Personnel Association in good standing."
Please do not misconstrue "Active Membership".. It is defined under Article IV, Section 1... In short.. "Active membership shall be continuous until the member leaves the school system, resigns from the Association, or fails to pay membership dues."
I know at least one other person expressed interested in the interim vice president position. They also stated they have served on a union committee at a previous employer.
I was going to wait to bring this up at the next meeting. Please consider the potentially deterring message this sends when we have such a low percentage of members involved at local meetings.
Thanks,
S***** *********
---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Voicemail System
Transcript:
Hey S***, this is N*** from the High School.S**** showed me your email.Mainly what happened was, I put my name in for the vice-president position, through a note and she sent me the whole memo back with the part of the qualifications highlighted.
Pretty much I thought you just had to be a union member, but I put that I was on the audit committee when I was working for an electrical company.
I haven't anything back since, and that was probably two weeks ago.
If you have any more questions, give me a call back.
----------End Forwarded Message ----------
To further,
I realize the president has the power to appoint anyone when a position is vacated mid-term. However please consider that the selection made does appear like a mis-use of power if there were other interested candidates.
Odd that the general membership has seen and spoken:
April 29th, 2006 marked the first annual Treasures report for the De Pere Educational Support Association in well over 5 years. Oddly enough, local treasurer Sue S**** was not present at this meeting. In a notice a few days after the meeting from the Union president the discrepancies discussed at the meting were clarified.
"The 3 sheets that were included in the packet were not for our union. They were samples sent from WEAC from other teacher unions and intended only to be used as an example for us when setting up our reports. When I printed off the reports I inadvertently included these and they were included in the packet."
In the March 2010 De Pere Educational Support Association officer election, 23 year veteran treasurer Sue S**** was defeated, by a 57 to 44 vote.
At this same meeting a motion was made and approved to form an Audit committee, to ensure that the hand-off to the new treasurer would be a smooth transition. It was noted that we had never performed an audit before.
At the October 2010 general membership meeting, the audit committee reported their findings. There was a lack of receipts for checks written.
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The general membership did not re-elect Sue S****. While this is a different position, it looks highly suspicious that Shirley steps down as VP only a meeting or two after being re-elected, oddly enough enabling Sue to come back.
I'm not trying to be a jerk here. I am just trying to point out why there might only be 12 or less people at a meeting. Think a minute how that sits with people. It's much like the current big government not listening to the people, IMHO.
S****
I also sent this "union" in review email:
This union is a joke. And I am ashamed of it.
We had a 20 some year veteran treasurer that didn’t make annual reports or save receipts.
We had several years where we skipped meetings and elections. Some times you had to petition just to have meetings.
Either way the meetings had little semblance of order.
You can’t volunteer or get involved because your told you don’t have experience. Yet they stress that less than 12% of members are involved.
Most often any type of question results in some sort of cold shoulder response.
If your having issues with co-workers and your supervisor isn’t addressing it, you are told you can only go to the union as a last resort.
Sadly the regional office isn’t much better.
You have to call multiple times, because calls are not always returned. Two part questions often yield one part responses.
Some times you end up sending certified letters.
They tell you in one breath they can’t get involved in local matters. They intervene when you don’t want them to.
Seems WEAC training has taught everyone well. It’s a dirty shame the deductions are automatic.
Now you know why I am often so cynical about it. Can you blame me?
Her response:
S****,
Before you speak about mis-use of power you should know the facts. It was not me alone that selected Sue S****, it was the executive committee. It was decided after we discussed Sue's qualifications and Nick's qualifications. We unanimously decided to have Sue be the interim vice president until elections for this position in the spring. As a group we said it would be nice to get someone new in but we had some reservations with Nick. Nick or anyone else is more than welcome to run for this office in the spring. I would strongly suggest that whomever does that they try to go for some training and attend our meetings.
If you recall at the time we had elections no one ran against Shirley so that is why she stayed in office. Because of the possibility of her retiring next year she decided to step down.
Going back to the 2006 meeting Sue was not present because she was in Madison at a WEAC meeting. Sue had emailed me the treasurer's report which was in an excel document and I inadvertently printed pages that were not for our union. The report showed an error of 30 some cents but there really was no error. The numbers in the spreadsheet were correct and when rechecked it was the balance total figure that was typed incorrectly.
When the audit committee reviewed what they had, the bank statements all matched with money received and dispensed. If you recall it was the decision of those present to accept the treasurer's books and move on. The union books Shirley G****** kept had the information regarding what was decided on to be paid out as stipends for attending meetings. These books were given to Jayne M***** but never passed on to me.
Regarding issues with co-workers I have been working to get things resolved. I have made suggestions to members regarding what they should do. I have gone to Pat M****, Edith R*****, Ben V******** and Kirby K**** trying to resolve matters. Also do you realize that the union cannot take a stance when it comes to union member vs union member? Unless members do what they need to do they can not expect me to do it for them. They need to be their own advocate. Gossip among members is what is behind the majority of the problems and it needs to stop.
I am sorry that you feel the way you do. Maybe you should consider running for an office if you feel that you could do a better job. The reason why so many people don't attend meetings is because they are fine with the way things are and don't want to give up their time.
Janice
Janice,
Thanks for the reply.
In my opinion this would have been a very nice opportunity for someone new or with less experience to get their feet wet. An interim (non full term) position is a great sink-or-swim chance for someone. (If they do well the membership can re-elect them, if not, they had their chance.) "Qualifications" can be a ambiguous word as exemplified by how things have been in the past with this union. (Lack of meetings, reports, etc. despite the combined veteran experience of past officers.)
I understand all the other situations. And on a more positive note, I think we have made major advancements in the last couple years. Again my glass-half-empty approach can be usefull if one applies it as a possible explanation why there is little involvement and turn out. Please remember that the not-so positive observations that I pointed out, unfortunately are the ones that people are likely to remember.
A plausible reverse-reason that there is little attendance at meetings is because they have been ignored and beat into submission before and feel things will likely never change, and think "so why bother?".
Again that is my cynical or glass-half-empty reverse view that also needs to be taken into consideration.
My communication concerns the image the union leaves with it's members and the district, I'm glad we can agree to disagree.
In my opinion everything needs balance, the best job I can do at this point is provide that, because after all I am not formally qualified anyway.
S****
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