Despite the steep number of educators and teachers union members who showed up to protest Gov. Scott Walker and his budget repair bill this past spring, the state announced last week more than 100 of the disheartened unions have filed for recertification with Wisconsin by last Friday’s deadline.
While the state has received a wide array of recertification requests from organizations across Wisconsin, Wisconsin Employment Relations Committee member Peter Davis said the vast majority of requests filed this year have come from teachers unions.
WERC received a total of 216 requests for certification from different unions, Davis said. Of the 216, Davis said 143 of the requests filed with WERC’s master list were from teachers unions.
Davis said 29 of the requests also belonged to support staff groups and the remaining 44 came from unions representing public employees from a wide range of fields, including substitute teacher groups and administrative support groups.
In order to gain recertification, unions are required to pay a fee ranging anywhere from $200 to $500, Davis said.
Still, some groups decided not to recertify this year, Davis said, likely because they did not think the state would approve their applications.
The University of Wisconsin’s Teaching Assistants’ Association was among the groups that did not apply for recertification within the state. TAA is a volunteer-run organization representing approximately 3,000 graduate employees at UW.
TAA Co-President Alex Hanna said the group listed three main reasons for not seeking recertification, citing the controversial budget repair bill as legitimate reason to refrain from filing.
Hanna said Walker’s repair bill enacted too many “hoops” for a teacher’s union to go through. He also said it would consequently take too much time for TAA to weave through all the new requirements.
“We found it would take a lot of valuable organizing time that we could be using for other kinds of organizing in our own union,” Hanna said. “[Another waste of resources is the requirement to focus] on a vote in which we would require a 51 percent vote of the entire bargaining unit instead of a simple majority.”
Hanna said the 51 percent majority requirement would be too difficult for the union to achieve. Under the previous law, a simple majority would be needed to pass a vote within an organization.
By not recertifying as a union, Hanna said that the TAA of Madison cannot collectively bargain contracts with the state but will remain an organization to support its members.
“Teachers unions are still unions that represent their members and fight for not only their members, but also their students and schools, whether they recertify or not,” Hanna said.
