It’s back to school time, and OAPSE members are ready for a great year! We have the buses ready to roll. The buildings are spotless. Student records are up-to-date and school offices are set to welcome children. Cafeterias are stocked and ready for hungry kids. And libraries are organized and quiet – but not for long!

OAPSE members have been working all summer to prepare buildings and buses for the start of the school year. And they will keep working to enhance the education of children in public schools throughout Ohio until school lets out next summer.

We salute the hard work of the 36,000 OAPSE members and the every-day impact they have on students and their families in a new video, “Back to School – OAPSE Proud and Union Strong!”

Take a look.

OAPSE members go the extra mile for the students they work with every day. So when members of Local 473 at Berea City Schools saw that their students needed help with school supplies, they did something about it and created the “Stuff the Bus” campaign, which collected more than $4,000 worth of supplies for district families.

Local President Laura Haas and Vice President Alice Sedivec had been thinking about the school supply needs of district children for a few years and decided that the time had come to put into action their plan of collecting school supplies for children in Berea Local Schools and filling a district bus with the donations.

“We know that our families are struggling just like everyone else, so we wanted to take action and make a difference in a meaningful way for our students and their parents,” said Haas.

She and Sedivec contacted their supervisor and the board of education, who okayed the use of a district bus and helped promote the event throughout the district.

“The next step was to enlist the help of the mayors of the cities we serve – Berea, Brook Park and Middleburg Heights. They were very helpful and extremely supportive. Each city put the information about “Stuff the Bus” on their websites and Facebook pages, and some put up notices in the recreation centers. It really helped us get the word out about what we were doing and how the community could join us in supporting our children,” Haas said.

Sedivec said “Stuff the Bus” drives were held in each of the three cities on three consecutive weekends. Supplies were then sorted, and on August 12, families could pick up the supplies at the Berea City Schools Transportation Department.

“This was all done by 18 volunteers from Local 473 and three family members, including our husbands. Some helped to sit with the bus collecting supplies, moving boxes off the buses, sorting out the supplies and handing them out and delivering extra supplies to each of the schools so they have some in case students need more.” said Haas.

She said the families who came to pick up supplies were grateful for the help.

“We got big hugs, and some people were crying because they appreciated our efforts and told us how much this was going to help them.”

Sedivec added, “It was a true labor of love to our communities. We are so proud to call Berea, Brook Park and Middleburg Heights home, and we’re looking forward to making this an annual event. It was an amazing experience.”

Just in time for the June 30 deadline, the Republican-controlled legislature passed the 2018-2019 Ohio biennial budget, which includes cuts to local governments and to hundreds of public school districts across the state.

OAPSE members who want to see how their school districts fared in the final budget can take a look here.

Overall, more than 156 school districts lose money in this budget. In addition, 218 districts are flat-lined with frozen funding. And those school districts that receive an increase will find on average only small bumps – less than 3 percent – in additional funding.

Governor Kasich released his two-year budget in February, and the legislature spent four months debating spending priorities. The bottom line after all that time and testimony is that public education dollars were cut and funding for charters and vouchers was increased.

In fact, while funding for public school remains below historic levels, charter schools will receive more than $1 billion in tax dollars – a record in Ohio.

And the state’s voucher program gets a 24 percent increase in the first year of the budget, and another 24 percent hike in the second year.

“This really shows the priorities of our governor and the legislature. And it is a reminder that elections have consequences. The people of Ohio elected these lawmakers, and this budget reflects the views of the governor and those elected officials who hold majorities in the Ohio House and Ohio Senate. They believe in weakening public schools and funneling tax dollars to private and for-profit charter schools. And they believe that private and religious schools should get voucher payments when parents choose them over public schools,” said Randy Weston, OAPSE director of political action and legislative affairs.

“This really is like déjà vu all over again,” said Weston. “This is Kasich’s fourth budget as governor, and in each one, he has advocated cutting taxes for the richest Ohioans and starving public services like public education, libraries, public hospitals, city and county governments and early childhood education.”

Weston also noted that when Kasich is confronted by the devastation caused by cuts to public schools and local governments, “He advises them to just pass local levies to make up the difference. So he is just passing these costs on to our communities – and acting as if local levies are easy to pass!”

Ohioans are willing to support their local schools, he said. But since Kasich took office, they have been paying a much bigger share of the education-funding burden. Since 2010, when Kasich first took office, Ohioans are paying at least $668 million more in school property taxes each year.

“And we are completely ignoring the DeRolph Ohio Supreme Court ruling that says it is unconstitutional to rely so heavily on property taxes to fund our schools,” Weston said.

Our local communities will also feel the budget pinch, as the new spending plan strips $35 million to cities and sends it to the state, shifts another $24 million from cities to townships and small villages and eliminates $20 million through doing away with a local government grant.

Kasich also cuts the state’s share of transportation dollars for public schools from 50 percent to 37.5 percent, “meaning less money to fund the work of OAPSE’s thousands of bus drivers and aides. This money will have to come from somewhere because school districts are obligated to transport kids safely to and from school. It just throws the problem in the lap of local school districts,” Weston said.

He added that districts will lose more than $11 million in special education dollars, and they will lose additional money because of the expansion of EdChoice – the vehicle for charter schools and vouchers.

These cuts are part of a long-term plan to redirect resources and reconfigure our tax system. According to Innovation Ohio, a think tank that specializes in Ohio budget and education issues, and media sources from around the state:

*Since 2010, the state has cut school funding by $1 billion and state funding going to local communities have been cut by almost $2 billion.

*Sales and property taxes have increased.

*Income taxes have been cut for millionaires and billionaires.

*Ohio has not been creating jobs, and 2016 was the worst year on record for Ohio job creation. Fewer jobs mean less income tax dollars collected.

*Nearly 1/3 of Ohio jobs pay poverty wages. And Ohio families bring home thousands of dollars less than the average American household.

*Ohio is the country’s leader in heroin and opioid overdoes.

*Tax breaks go to the wealthiest Ohioans and to small businesses, which pay NO TAX on the first $250,000 in income and only 3 percent on income over that number.

“So the result of all these factors is less tax money going to fund critical programs for Ohio families. And Kasich and the legislative leaders left nearly $1 billion in the state’s “rainy day fund”. I think most mayors and school boards will say it’s been storming for years,” Weston said.

OAPSE leaders are vowing to fight back and keep the pressure on administrators at the School Employees Retirement System (SERS) after the Ohio Legislature and Governor Kasich acted to cut and freeze retirement benefits for OAPSE members and retirees.

The cuts and freezes were recommended by the administrators at SERS. Unfortunately, instead of taking up that language in a stand-alone bill, lawmakers opted to sneak the SERS language into the 5,000-page biennial state budget. The budget bill was signed by the governor on June 30.

As a result, SERS will have the ability to enact cuts and freezes to cost of living increases (COLAs) for retirees in the pension system. SERS is set to take that action this fall, so cuts and freezes in COLAs can go into effect January 1, 2018.

“We are obviously very disappointed that the Republican-led legislature and the governor ignored OAPSE members and targeted our retirees in this state budget bill,” said OAPSE Executive Director Joe Rugola. “But that doesn’t mean we are giving up. We will continue to fight this attack on career school employees who are just asking for a retirement benefit that allows them to live with dignity.”

Hundreds of OAPSE members and retirees marched on the statehouse and on the SERS building on June 7 with the message, “Keep the Promise. Protect our Pensions!” They gathered to protest the cuts and freezes and to ask legislators and SERS administrators to consider other options to boost the retirement system’s bottom line.

Rugola reminded the June 7 crowd that for more than 20 years, OAPSE has been encouraging SERS administrators to focus on providing long-term benefits to long-term school employees.

“We have been talking with SERS for years about the need to take care of our members who have worked 25, 30, 35 and even more than 40 years in our schools. These are the people who have given their whole lives and careers to helping improve the lives of our public school children. They should not be targeted with reduced pensions after decades of public service,” Rugola said.

OAPSE members make on average about $24,000 per year, and have retirement benefits of less than $1,200 per month, according to SERS.

“We don’t make a lot of money, and we don’t retire rich,” said OAPSE State President JoAnn Johntony. “We are only asking for fairness so we can live with peace of mind after we spend a lifetime caring for our children.”

Randy Weston, OAPSE director of political action and legislative affairs, said it is especially disturbing that the Republicans in the legislature buried the COLA language in a huge, complicated budget bill instead of having the guts to pass a stand-alone bill.

“Our members marched on the statehouse, and State Vice President Lois Carson testified before the House Committee on Aging and Long-term Care to make sure legislators knew this language would really harm our retirees who are counting on a COLA to make ends meet,” Weston said.

He said all but one Democratic lawmaker supported OAPSE members and voted against the budget bill.

“We had very strong and public support for OAPSE members and retirees from State Representative Kathleen Clyde (D-Kent), State Representative Dan Ramos (D-Lorain) and State Senator Cecil Thomas (D-Cincinnati), who were with us at our June 7 march and voted against this budget bill,” Weston said.

He stressed that this budget vote is a great example of the fact that elections matter.

“With a Republican-controlled legislature and a Republican governor, this was an uphill battle because working families are not represented in the numbers we need to have their voices matter. This underscores the importance of the governor’s race in 2018,” Weston said.

Rugola said the union will continue the fight to protect the retirement security of OAPSE members.

“Our emphasis now will be on making sure SERS understands that it is not fair to ask long-term public school workers and retirees to shoulder the burden of solving a funding problem they did not create. This is asking too much of us. We hope that the leaders at SERS will explore other options. We want to work with SERS to come up with creative alternatives that do not penalize retirees who count on their COLAs to survive,” he said.

Watch your email inbox and check www.oapse.org for important updates about how you can join the fight for fair pensions.

For more on OAPSE’s work on this critical issue, check out the video below: