RALEIGH -- The Republican legislature is targeting one public employee union while making nice with another - a reflection of the hardball politics being played in North Carolina's Capital City these days.
The House this week is expected to move to bar the payroll deduction of dues of the N.C. Association of Educators, the main lobbying voice for teachers in the state. The measure has already passed the Senate.
At the same time, the legislature has taken a hands off approach to the dues checkoff of the other major public employee union, State Employees Association of North Carolina. In fact, the GOP legislature has worked to bring SEANC to the table during key negotiations.
The reason seems to be that the NCAE, with its close ties to the Democratic Party and Democratic Gov. Bev Perdue, has angered the Republican leadership, while SEANC has played a more neutral role.
"They are coming after us in an effort to bully us because we have been very vocal in laying out the facts in this budget debate," said Scott Anderson, executive director of the NCAE. "We are ranked 46th in the country in per-pupil funding, while the budget that passed the legislature will take us at least to 49th - right around where Mississippi usually is."
Dana Cope, executive director of SEANC, said the teachers took an overly aggressive and partisan approach to the Republican majority, and it backfired.
"Our issues, taxpayer issues and state employee issues, are not partisan," Cope said. "We have a philosophy around here that we have no permanent friends and no permanent enemies, but permanent issues."
Mutual feelings
There are two main public employee unions in North Carolina that represent state workers and teachers, although there are unions that represent smaller groups. North Carolina and Virginia are the only two states in the country that have a total ban on collective bargaining by public employees, but employees may still join together to lobby for higher wages and benefits through the political process.
The NCAE, which is a local of the National Education Association, represents 60,000 teachers, teacher assistants and other school personnel across the state.
During the 2010 elections, the NCAE and the NEA spent $300,000 in an independent effort to help elect Democratic legislators - mainly in response to a more-than-$2 million independent effort headed by Raleigh businessman Art Pope to elect a Republican majority.
The teachers group has actively opposed the GOP-backed budget cuts in education, bringing 7,000 of its members to rally in Raleigh last month. The NCAE has also fought the legislature on such issues as school vouchers and expanding charter schools.
"We don't support their agenda, and we have been out in every community organizing school employees around that," Anderson said.
In recent days, the NCAE has sent fliers into the districts of five conservative Democrats who voted for the Republican-crafted budget.
In retribution for sending in the fliers, House Speaker Thom Tillis told a GOP House caucus Friday that they would pass a bill ending the dues check-off, saying, "We just want to give them a little taste of what's about to come."
At the state Republican convention in Wilmington on Saturday, Tillis said the NCAE represented only 30 percent of the educators in the state.
"They don't care about kids. They don't care about classrooms," Tillis said. "They only care about their jobs and their pensions."
The NCAE believes there have been other legislative efforts to undercut their organization as well. Despite the budget crisis, the recently passed budget includes for the first time $3.7 million in liability insurance for teachers, a service traditionally provided by the NCAE.
Anderson said the GOP efforts have served to galvanize the NCAE membership. He said the dues check-off is a matter of convenience, and that the NCAE had functioned without it prior to 1991.
If the legislature passes a law barring payroll deduction, Anderson said the NCAE would go to court to challenge the constitutionality of allowing dues check-off for one set of employees, but not another.
NCAE President Sherri Strickland sent a letter to Tillis on Monday asking for a meeting Wednesday at NCAE headquarters "to have an open conversation about the impact your proposed budget will have on our students."
A spokesman for Tillis said the speaker tries to meet with everyone, but because this is bill crossover week, he could not commit to a meeting Wednesday.
Nonpartisan approach
The legislature's treatment of the SEANC has been sharply different. SEANC, with its 55,000 members is Local 2008 of the Service Employees International Union.
SEANC plays both sides of the political aisle and backed Republican Patrick Ballantine in the 2004 governor's race. It largely stayed neutral in the 2010 legislative races, except to run a major campaign against Democratic House Majority leader Hugh Holliman.
The Republican leadership has invited SEANC to participate in helping draft changes in the state employee health plan, while giving lobbyists for the teachers only two minutes to speak at a public hearing.
Cope said the Republican budget is better for state employees than the budget that was submitted by Perdue, with fewer layoffs for SEANC members.
"I am a registered Democrat," Cope said. "I am someone who they are at least inviting to the table, allowing me to speak on ideas of public policy. I don't win every time. But at least we are successful in shaping public policy and the state health plan - things that matter to tax payers and our members.
"I don't see NCAE members in that room."
Cope said public employee unions have to be realistic. Because the Republicans control the redistricting process, it is likely they will be in power in the legislature for at least the next six years.
Cope said he is not happy to see the legislature try to end dues check-off for teachers: "I think everyone has a right to have a voluntary system where the worker chooses to have a dues deduction."
