BUFFALO, N.Y. — The Buffalo Public School District is under fire and in the spotlight.
“We are disappointed, discouraged and a little dismayed at the timing and certainly the underhanded nature in which these had been put up,” General Counsel Nathanial Kuzma said.
On Tuesday, the Buffalo Teachers Federation took their concerns public, placing billboards around the city demanding change.
“We wanted to make sure that the public understand just what has happened to the Buffalo teachers, how far behind we are everybody else around us,” teachers federation president Phil Rumore said.
It comes amid an ongoing three-year contract negotiation between BPS and its teachers, which are asking for better pay, more support staff and safer working conditions
“Most Buffalo teachers don't feel valued because of the district's delaying, and some of the terrible offers that they've made,” Rumore said.
This month the two sides completed a fact finding process with an outside third party in an attempt to reach a fair agreement and are expected to receive a non-binding recommendation in the coming weeks.
However, in that process Kuzma says at no point did the teachers federation raise the statistic or assertion used on the billboards.
“The time to present this evidence, these facts is at the bargaining table to the fact finder, to the other side. We're not, I'm not negotiating with a billboard,” he said.
And while BTF has put the responsibility on BPS for the entire city to see, the general counsel tonight is saying the federation and its president are just as much to blame.
"Our current superintendent has been on the job for six months,” Kuzma said. “[Rumore] has been in that chair for 42 years. He cannot absolve himself of the accountability for the fact that his teachers do not have a contract, and from the fact that they've only had one contract in 24 years.”