‘Inside the CUNY Union’

Re: “Inside the CUNY Union,” Editorial, February 8, 2005. The Professional Staff Congress, the union that represents CUNY’s faculty and professional staff, has never announced, “proudly” or otherwise, that it will not respect the laws governing collective bargaining. On the contrary, the union has been bargaining in good faith with CUNY management for almost two years. We declared a state of emergency in the contract negotiations because CUNY management has failed to make a viable financial offer and invest in the people who make CUNY work.

If there has been a renaissance at the City University, it is because of the teaching and research we do, often in substandard conditions. CUNY’s subway ads boast about “studying with the best,” yet CUNY’s financial offer – 1.5% over four years – not only insults “the best”; it has already prompted some top scholars to consider positions elsewhere. The way to honor CUNY’s potential and support its extraordinary, driven, rewarding students is to provide adequate salaries, benefits, and conditions for those who teach them.

As part of the state of emergency, the union has initiated an open discussion of the whole range of tactics historically used by the labor movement to resolve contract negotiations. The passage you quote is from one of those internal discussions. Such discussions are in the best traditions of academia and trade unionism.

BARBARA BOWEN
President, Professional Staff Congress, CUNY
Manhattan

‘Reverse Robin Hood’

Robert Samuelson advocates cutting Social Security because retirees are wealthier than people who are currently working [“Reverse Robin Hood,” Opinion, February 9, 2005]. However, there is no crisis in Social Security and only minor tinkering is necessary to keep it solvent.

Social Security operates on a pay-as-you-go basis. There is an implied contract between the older and younger generation – where the current wage-earners pay for the Social Security benefits of the retirees. When the retirees worked, they paid for those who were retired at that time. Therefore, why should the rules change and penalize the current generation of retirees?

REBA SHIMANSKY
Manhattan

Repeal Rent Control

If Fernando Ferrer wants New York to be a place where the “working class expands,” he should also be a staunch advocate for the repeal of rent control [“Ferrer: My ‘One New York,’ ” Letters, February 10, 2005]. It is one thing to pontificate about generalities like a typical politician, but quite another to have the courage to lead the fight to rid ourselves of a postwar anachronism that contributes heavily to the two New Yorks, namely the one above and the one below 125th Street in Manhattan.

Since what Mr. Ferrer calls the “gap of affordability” largely consists of the rental costs that often consume half or more of a working adult’s pay after taxes, it only makes sense that he start closing this gap by wrenching the pacifier of rent control out of the jaws of a population that has appropriated the property rights of others for long enough. Then, and only then, will the rental market in New York City begin to stabilize and eventually see the return of the working class this would-be mayor would have us believe he champions.

ESTHER KHANNA MENDOZA
Bronx

Village Club Has Lost Relevance

The Village Independent Democrats was once a large, proud independent voice of the Village, but I’m not sure it merited the hoopla of your article by Jill Gardiner [“Village Club Expected To Kick Off Endorsements,” New York, February 10, 2005]. They used to draw 1,500 people to a meeting. Now, with a shrunken paper membership, they represent no one.

I stand corrected. They represent Speaker Sheldon Silver, whose handmaiden and most loyal servant, Assembly Member Deborah Glick, has total control over the moribund body. Ms. Glick got to the Assembly on the backs of thousands of gay pioneers who fought hard for the civil rights lacking in their community. Ms. Glick rode in on our hard work and has been a total disappointment since she has taken office. She has cost the city a great number of jobs, tax dollars, and vibrancy. No wonder so many of us gays have moved to Chelsea and Clinton and away from Ms. Glick’s Assembly district.

KEVIN KAVANAUGH
Manhattan

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