AGAINST ISSUE 2

Union president calls SB 5 ‘unsafe,’ ‘unfair’

He says students will suffer because of larger class sizes.

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By Christopher Magan, Staff Writer Updated 11:40 PM Sunday, September 18, 2011

David Romick, Dayton Education Association president, is one leader of what he expects to be a tidal wave of “grass-roots” opposition to the biggest reforms to collective bargaining in two decades.

The Dayton Public Schools union represents about 1,000 teachers who would see collective bargaining curtailed if Senate Bill 5 survives referendum and becomes law.

“We are one of thousands of groups of educators across the state that are creating grass-roots campaigns, going door-to-door and phone-to-phone,” Romick said. “Issue 2 is unsafe, it’s unfair and it hurts the middle class.”

Romick said his members have worked tirelessly with Dayton schools administrators to improve student performance and deal with large reductions in state and local revenues. “If we have a seat at the table we can impact the type of education kids are going to get.”

Supporters of Senate Bill 5 say the measure will save schools money, allow administrators to fire ineffective teachers and better shape student instruction.

But Romick believes the bill is just a guise to hamstring public employee unions, some of the few unions left in the state. “There is no way Senate Bill 5 is going to save any money,” Romick said. “I’m left to think it is nothing else but an attack on unions under a cloak of dollars and cents.”

In the end, Romick said, students will suffer because class sizes will be larger and there will be fewer teachers who are poorly paid.

“Their experience in public schools could be drastically changing,” he said.

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