Day Care Directors Express Fears, Frustrations
by Anne Silverstein
About 25 Day Care members attended the first of CSA’s annual borough meetings on Sept. 27 in East New York, Brooklyn.
Each year, the union holds a meeting in each of the boroughs except for Staten Island. The meetings are held to provide information to the members as well as to get feedback from the members.
CSA First Vice President Randi Herman and CSA Counsel Charity Guerra discussed the moribund Day Care contract, which expired more than five years ago. They both told members that they must continue to reach out to elected officials, community boards and CBOs to educate people about the services early childhood centers provide to children and families.
Dr. Herman said, “We need to educate people about what we do. They’re not hearing from educators. They’re not hearing from people who are working with children and families everyday.”
Members expressed their frustrations about the contract situation because they fear that their health benefits will be stripped away. They also expressed their fears that they will lose their jobs as the city overhauls the Day Care system during the implementation of EarlyLearn NYC.
EarlyLearn requires that Day Care Center boards reapply for city money to stay open.The application is lengthy and complicated and some Directors fear they didn’t have the resources to even fill out eligible applications. One of the most upsetting requirements of EarlyLearn is that the Day Care boards will have to contribute 7 percent of the Center’s operating costs, an impossibility many Boards say.
“In the past, at least, there were meetings where we could talk about contract rights. Now all doors are shut. It’s now a waiting game. What is the union doing?” said George Peña Herrera, who is the Director of East Calvary Day Care Center, Manhattan.
Dr. Herman acknowledged that she, too, was angry at the city’s refusal to negotiate with CSA, but emphasized that Day Care Directors and Assistant Directors continue to have an important job to do – preparing the city’s children for their school careers.
The city refuses to acknowledge that Day Care Directors are city employees saying that
the Directors work for independent boards that run individual Day Care Centers and are, as such, individual contractors with the city. CSA has tried various legal avenues, including filing a grievance with the NYS Public Employment Relations Board, to have some government agency acknowledge what is so clear to union officials as well as Day Care members: that they do, indeed, work for the city. Most Directors and Assistant Directors have more interaction with the city’s Administration for Childrens Services and other city agencies that with their own boards.
Yuridia Peña contributed to this report.
