CTU faces contract talks, likely without its leader
Now that Karen Lewis is officially out of the mayor’s race, the buzz has focused on what happens without her as she seeks treatment for a brain tumor. What’s less clear is what her absence could now mean for 30,000 teachers and other school workers depending on her skills at the bargaining table as the union seeks a new contract.
The contract — the one that culminated in a historic strike in 2012 — expires in June. The CTU is preparing for formal negotiations, surveying its members and pulling together its big bargaining team, which last time numbered about 35 people, said Jesse Sharkey, the union’s understated vice president, who assumes all of Lewis’ duties “until she’s recovered.”
“No one could tell the board their ideas were crazy with more humor and more humanity than Karen. She kept it real,” said Sharkey.
“I was often left to look after the details. She was our lead spokesperson at the table. She had a lot of impact on the tenor and tone of those talks. . . . That’s going to be the hardest thing about Karen’s illness. Those are big shoes to fill,” Sharkey added.
Over those months of talks, Lewis forged a relationship with CPS’ Barbara Byrd- Bennett, who was about to become CEO of the school system. Lewis, at whom Mayor Rahm Emanuel once hurled the F- word, has regularly met with the schools chief during the last several years. Both women
“No one could tell the board their ideas were crazy with more humor and more humanity than Karen. She kept it real.”
Jesse Sharkey, CTU vice president
are in their 60s and both African- American.
Both also, Byrd- Bennett said by telephone Tuesday, spent years in classrooms, which led the two to have “an interesting chemistry” that began at the bargaining table.
“When it came down to what teachers needed, what she brought was the authentic voice of a teacher. I think that’s why we had that initial click,” the schools chief said. “We’re really hoping for a full recovery for her. It’s incredibly sad.”
A spokesman Tuesday couldn’t say when negotiations could begin, but Lewis likely will miss this round as she recuperates Sharkey at the helm.
“Who knows exactly what her immediate or midterm future is for sure, but I imagine the union has to make preparations to think about being at the bargaining table without her there,” said Robert Bruno, a professor of labor at University of Illinois at Chicago who’s co- writing a book about the 2012 strike.
Sharkey said he is confident in his ability to work on a contract. What’s harder will be serving as the CTU’s public face.
“She was a loved figure in the city — both loved and hated. She becomes the lightning rod; that’s something which makes it easier for the rest of us to do our jobs. I have to see what that’s like,” he said. “I can only approach that as me.”
The 2012 strike turned the charismatic and feisty Lewis into household name in Chicago and a labor leader on the national stage, too.
Sharkey, 44, has kept a much lower profile since being voted into CTU leadership with Lewis in 2010 as part of the progressive Caucus of Rank and File Educators party that swept out long- serving CTU leaders.