July 1, 2004

BY KATE N. GROSSMAN AND ROSALIND ROSSI Staff Reporters

Come daybreak today, we're in for an old-fashioned showdown at the Chicago Teachers Union offices at the Merchandise Mart.

Deborah Lynch was scheduled to hand over power to newly elected President Marilyn Stewart today, but late Tuesday, a union committee threw out the election results.

With no firm date for a re-election, both women say they're in charge. They met Wednesday evening but couldn't reach a resolution.

"President Lynch and the other officers in the CTU, as the last duly appointed officers of the union, will remain in office," Kathrin Koenig, the CTU general counsel, said at 8:30 p.m. Wednesday.

Koenig said she expected Stewart's team to stay home, but Stewart's spokeswoman said she was sorely mistaken. "We have every intention of taking office tomorrow at 9 a.m," Rose Maria Genova said about 9:15 p.m.

"We are the duly elected officers, and we will take office," Stewart said in a statement.

Earlier Wednesday, a building engineer changed the CTU office locks at Lynch's request. She said she did it because members of Stewart's caucus came in uninvited this week to hand out pink slips to as many as 15 employees.

There is only one way to summarize what has happened, explained Paul Green of Roosevelt University: "It's classic Chicago hard-nosed politics," the director of the school of policy studies said. CTU officials say they are working on a new election date but the summer vacation poses logistical problems. The uncertainty comes just days after Mayor Daley announced a plan to create 100 new schools, potentially displacing thousands of teachers and opening charter or contract schools that won't have to adhere to the union contract.

The brouhaha began late Tuesday when a CTU canvassing committee charged with resolving election disputes tossed out the results of the June 11 vote, citing "significant ballot discrepancies and evidence of fraud."

CTU officials say this includes about 600 ballots sent out but never returned and about 30 signatures on ballots that did not match signatures on record. There also were more than 100 teachers who were absent but voted -- not illegal but an indicator that raised a red flag.

Teachers also complained about having to sign an unofficial ballot sheet. One said she voted a day before the election, Koenig said. She said these facts -- some of which emerged during a review by the outside agency that oversaw the election -- concerned them so they were forwarded to the union's canvassing committee.

Three committee members voted to throw out the results, one abstained, and one voted against, said Judy Dever, an independent committee member appointed by Stewart. The committee includes two Lynch caucus members, three "independents" appointed by Lynch and two Stewart appointees, Koenig said. One Stewart appointee was absent, and the chair didn't vote, Koenig said.

Dever says the "fraud" amounts to next to nothing. To make her point, she quoted an official with the American Arbitration Association, the group that certified the election.

He told the committee the missing ballots wouldn't have tipped the balance in Lynch's favor because half would have likely gone to each candidate. The electorate was nearly evenly divided, with Stewart defeating Lynch by just 566 votes.

The fraud amounts to just 30 votes with questionable signatures, Dever said.

"I just feel these four people totally overreacted," Dever said. "I call it sour grapes and poor losers."

Lynch defended her actions.

"Our canvassing committee is the constitutional body charged with resolving discrepancies, and they're alleging very, very serious charges here, and our interest here, as it has always been, is union democracy and fair elections," Lynch said. "That's what this is about."

Her supporters quickly came to her defense.

"I think there probably was a lot of fraud there and a lot of hanky panky going on," said Sharonese Biles, a union delegate and teacher. She said ballots at her school weren't picked up in the primary election and that made her question the whole process. Stewart was later elected in a run-off election June 11.

"I'll feel better if it's fair and square with a new election."

In a statement, American Arbitration Association officials said the challenges to the election are not related to the elements they were responsible for. CTU officials oversaw registration, distribution of ballots and the sealing of ballot boxes. The association was responsible for receiving ballot boxes and tabulating results.

Union dissenter says Lynch 'shopped' for a new runoff

BY ROSALIND ROSSI Education Reporter

After losing a close runoff election for Chicago Teachers Union president, Deborah Lynch and her forces armed themselves for hardball.

They sent out e-mails asking for examples of voting irregularities and called in a handwriting expert who had helped knock a Milwaukee Democrat off a primary ballot for Wisconsin governor two years ago, insiders say.

Then they turned over their work to the union's canvassing committee.

After sitting around a 15-foot-long table for seven hours, committee members this week voted 3-1, with one abstention, to hold another election.

The lone dissenter on that vote, Judy Dever, told the Chicago Sun-Times on Wednesday that a June 21 e-mail to union members amounted to "shopping for complaints,'' although Lynch spokesman Jay Rehak said it was prompted by other complaints the union had received.

In addition, Dever said, Lynch forces had sampled 96 schools, or one-sixteenth of the system, and found that about 30 votes in 16 of those schools had been cast by people who were absent and whose voting-day signatures did not match others on record for them.

The signature evidence the committee considered was based on an affidavit by Bonnie Schwid, whose handwriting work helped knock Wisconsin state Sen. Gary George off the gubernatorial primary ballot in 2002. But committee members never got to see the signatures in question, Dever said.

She said Lynch forces conceded they never asked the absent teachers if they actually voted.

In about 13 schools in question, Dever said, only one ballot each was at issue. But Schwid's work, and what to do with it, consumed about five hours of Tuesday's seven-hour meeting, she said.

Also at issue were 616 "unaccounted for'' votes, which an American Arbitration Association expert dismissed by phone as an inconsequential number, and 569 "missing ballots'' from 115 schools, Dever said. The association expert said the missing ballots, if split in half, would not have turned the election, Dever said.

An arbitration association spokesman refused to confirm or deny Dever's account, and Lynch forces did not return calls for comment on it. Dever said the committee "overreacted" to 30 votes.

"Who are we to send thousands of members back to the polls on this kind of information?'' Dever said. "It's a disgusting situation.''