LAKEVIEW, Mich. - Bus drivers in Lakeview Community Schools in Montcalm County say the district has refused to bargain with them over plans to privatize transportation, while the district superintendent said the union failed to submit a bid when invited, according to the Greenville Daily News.
The Lakeview Education Support Personnel Association has since filed an unfair labor practice charge, while the board of education will take up the issue again in April, according to the News.
Superintendent Dixie Pope has estimated that contracting with Michigan Educational Transportation Services would save the district about $199,000, the equivalent of four teaching positions, the News reported. She said she invited LESPA to submit a bid along with METS, but that it did not.
Michigan Education Association Uniserv director Ervin Platt told the News that the district did not give the drivers a chance to bargain over the issue. The current contract between the union and the district expires in 2012, according to the News.
SOURCE:
The (Greenville) Daily News, "Lakeview's
bus drivers cry foul," March 17, 2010
FURTHER READING:
Mackinac Center for Public Policy, "Defeating
Privatization: The MEA's Legal Strategies," July 5, 2007
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