WTU Prez Spends Union Monies On Nonsense

At the February 14th WTU Executive Board meeting- I was saddened to learn that WTU President, George Parker sought a legal opinion on the union's liability for 'freedom of speech' statements made by any of its union officers including the leadership, board members and local school union representatives in the press or on blogs. The title of the legal opinion is 'Potential Liability For Speech.' I would argue that Parker did this in an attempt to try to block other meaningful dialogue about the critical issues that impact teachers. Listening to this legal presentation took away valuable time from other issues that needed to be discussed. It seems to me that Parker's other motive may have been to discourage board members from exercising their right to free speech in the press and on blogs.

Again without any input from the WTU Executive Board, Mr. Parker forged ahead in his typical dictatorial style. As a fiduciary agent of our union, I suspect and am concerned that this legal opinion may have cost our union membership thousands of dollars. What I gleaned from this presentation is that defamation lawsuits can prevail against unions, officers and individuals ONLY IF what members say is intentionally false and causes injury to a person's position within society. The truth is always an absolute defense as it should be. I think this is a no brainer for most of us.

What was even more troubling is that board members were not provided a copy of this legal opinion of which might I add union dues helped to pay for. The real travesty in this is that even if board members wanted to digest this document in its entirety they couldn't because they were requested to return the document to the WTU before leaving which was totally absurd.

I can think of better things that we as a union can spend our funds on like assisting our union members. This certainly is a matter that needs to come before the WTU Representative Assembly. All union members have a 'right to know' what our union dues are spent on and demand accountability from our union president. (Posted by The Washington Teacher).