Yesterday, Colorado voters not only rejected Democrat Sen. Mark Udall’s re-election bid, they passed a very important, under-reported ballot measure. Colorado’s Proposition 104 will “require all school boards to have their collective bargaining negotiation meetings open to the public.”
As is the case in Washington State, under current Colorado state law, school boards do not have to conduct negotiations in public. The public only becomes privy to how hard-earned tax dollars will be spent when the results of the secret meetings are posted online and negotiations are all said and done.
Certainly, Proposition 104 represents a significant win for government transparency in Colorado. Given Jay Inslee’s tendency toward secrecy—and the results of his secret “negotiations” with state employee unions—Washington State sure could use a similar victory for transparency.
Just another way to sabotage bargaining and attack working people and their unions. The contracts themselves are public.
Want to support public negotiations for government contracts with businesses? Shouldn’t we expose the sweetheart deals between corporate and rich donors and elected politicians? Or the revolving door between many of them in office and the cushy corporate jobs they get in payment for “services rendered” after they leave?
Didn’t think so. Hypocrisy.
So if negotiations can’t be done in secret behind closed doors this sabotages bargaining and attacks working people? Are you SEIU, AFSCME or WEA? Actually I do support public negotiations for ALL government contracts and we should expose the secret deals made by elected politicians, like the way Harry Reid has never worked a day in his life for anybody but the government yet has an estimated net worth of $5-6 million. You really didn’t think much. Screech on.
Stop the insults. As I said, the contracts are public, so there are no “secret deals”. And I have no idea what Harry Reid’s life has to do with this. if you had any experience in negotiating in any context, you’d know it just doesn’t work when negotiators have to worry about their comments and positions being publicized, often out of context. It doesn’t work in business, or legal matters, or international relations, or collective bargaining. If you don’t like the contracts, then vote out the elected officials that bargained them. That’s how it’s supposed to work, and this phony idea of transparency is just meant to damage the process.
Well, if the bargaining is done in private, and the public only knows after an agreement is reached, then yeah, it’s a “secret deal.” Public unions need to be abolished, the taxpayer doesn’t need to be supporting rich ass union bosses when nobody is negotiating for the guy that pays the wages.
The deal isn’t secret – you’re just redefining the word – and it has to be ratified by elected officials as well. You’ve drunk the Kool-aid of “rich union bosses” – unions are led by elected leaders voted in by the members, whose dues pay them, not taxpayers.
Collective bargaining is considered a fundamental right in just about every modern democracy (maybe not here in our oligarchy of the rich). What’s the problem with democratic rights for working people anyway?
It’s pretty obvious that our corporate masters want to get rid of organized labor, so they can drive wages down further and keep more for themselves. What’s really sad is the working people who have been indoctrinated into thinking unions are “bad’. Goodbye middle class and democracy if they succeed!