FOCUS: Property tax cap
Critics claim state teachers union leads fight against property tax cap
ALBANY — The groups fighting Gov. David A. Paterson’s plan to cap property taxes appear populist enough: the Alliance for Quality Education, the Working Families Party, Citizen Action.
But they share a connection to a group with a vested interest in the outcome of the debate: the state’s big teachers union.
Come Tuesday, when lawmakers return to Albany for a special session, these groups will help decide the extent of relief New Yorkers will see from the state’s rising property tax burden.
The groups’ opponents, including business interests and conservative groups, say the organizations are front groups for New York State United Teachers — the union that has made stopping Paterson’s tax cap its top priority.
“Ultimately, this is all about the interests of one particularly powerful labor union — NYSUT,” said E. J. McMahon, director of the Empire Center for Public Policy, a conservative think tank.
“The governor and I have not made this issue about the teachers union,” said Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi, chairman of the state panel that recommended the tax cap. “But the teachers union is now putting themselves front and center on this issue. I think, ultimately, that’s a strategy that will backfire on them.”
The campaign to stop the cap is intense. NYSUT last week withheld endorsements from 38 state senators who voted for the Paterson tax cap. The Working Families Party mailed out 200,000 fliers in a bid to ensure the Democratic-run Assembly does not take up the cap this week. The party, along with the Alliance for Quality Education, has begun a one-week, $1.5 million TV ad campaign blasting the cap. It has also run radio ads.
NYSUT defends its efforts to stop the cap, which it believes will devastate school funding.
“There are many groups speaking out on this, and we’re proud to stand shoulder to shoulder with them,” said Richard Iannuzzi, president of 600,000-member NYSUT.
Not ‘front groups’
The other organizations, which also rely on state funding for some of their functions, bristle at any notion that they are NYSUT front groups.
“There’s no question the groups work together — but there’s no question each [is] independent, with independent boards and independent interests,” said Karen Scharff, executive director of Citizen Action.
“We are not dependent on the teachers union for any substantial, ongoing portion of our budget,” said Billy Easton, executive director of the Alliance for Quality Education, who said any notion that the group is doing the bidding of NYSUT is “a misrepresentation and a very cynical viewpoint.”
The groups are connected in several ways.
Most visible in the campaign against the tax cap have been the Working Families Party and the Alliance. To help pay for the $1.5 million ad campaign to halt the Paterson plan, the groups turned to a reliable fun-der from the past — NYSUT.
NYSUT said yes to a “substantial” donation, according to the Alliance, but no specific information was released.
Citizen Action is an activist group “dedicated to promoting social welfare and improving the quality of life in the New York State area” that also has a long history of Democratic Party ties.
Besides a couple of decades of promoting a liberal social agenda in Albany, the group was tight with former Gov. Eliot
L. Spitzer and financially backed his fight to weaken the grip of the GOP in the State Senate.
Citizen Action, which also receives state funding, has donated to a who’s who of Democratic politicians in New York. The group and its affiliates also have gotten $296,000 in contributions, most of it from labor unions but also tens of thousands from state politicians (mostly Democrats), state election records show.
Financially connected
NYSUT gave the group $10,000 in 2006, and another teachers union now part of NYSUT gave thousands more over the years. Citizen Action’s board members have included a teachers union representative.
Housed with Citizen Action in a building a few blocks west of the State Capitol is Nexus Management Corp., a private firm run by the group. Together, the two entities have given $94,000 to the Working Families Party since 2000. Citizen Action is also a member of the party’s executive board.
Also in the same office is the Public Policy and Education Fund, which is “related” to Citizen Action, according to IRS filings. State comptroller records show the group received a $50,000 contract this spring from Senate Minority Leader Malcolm Smith for an Education Department grant for “educating consumers on their rights” concerning health insurance coverage.
Another benefactor to the group has been the Working Families Party, which has given it $22,000 since 2006. IRS records also show a $165,000 grant in 2006 from a group of education-related grantmakers in New York City.
Also housed in the building with Citizen Action is the Alliance for Quality Education, also listed on IRS filings as “related” to Citizen Action. The Alliance calls itself the state’s “lead community- based organization in the fight for high-quality education.”
Helping their cause over the years has been the teachers union. Since 2003, NYSUT has given the Alliance $126,000, reports show, not including an unknown share of the $1.5 million ad campaign. The Alliance also helps fund Citizen Action at times; in 2006, it provided $37,000 to the group.
The Working Families Party is a minor political party that causes heartburn for many state politicians, in part because of the strong union backing that critics say drives much of the party’s agenda. Various teachers unions, now all under the NYSUT umbrella, have pumped $371,000 into the party during the past eight years. The Buffalo Teachers Federation, a founding member of the party, has donated $13,500.
In their fight to stop the property tax cap, which would keep annual school property tax increases at 4 percent or 120 percent of the inflation rate, whichever is less, the groups are pushing an alternative plan to give tax breaks and freezes to low-and moderate-income families. They also want to hike income taxes on people making more than $500,000 a year.
Critics say NYSUT has smartly turned to allies — such as the Working Families Party and the Alliance — to do much of the public battling over the tax cap issue.
Shared values
Tax cap opponents say it is only natural for like-minded organizations to band together.
“We share values. We share ideas. We share money sometimes. We’re kind of proud of that in a way. These are close allies,” said Dan Cantor, executive director of the Working Families Party.
“Front group? That’s pejorative. We’re definitely in alliance, but not just with the teachers, but parents, PTAs and school board people,” he added.
NYSUT has never been shy about spreading around money to affect public policy. In May, it spent $2 million trying to affect the outcome of more than 700 school district budget votes.
Easton, of the Alliance for Quality Education, said NYSUT’s help to his group over the years has been around specific activities, such as the current tax cap fight and past efforts to bolster state aid to schools. But he said the Alliance does not find itself in the ring with NYSUT on every one of the union’s major issues.
“One of the largest NYSUT issues this year was teacher tenure,” Easton said of efforts to expand the job protection laws for teachers. “You will find a consistent record of total silence on that by us.”
Easton said his group should not be criticized for working with a union that represents teachers. “The fact that a parent- and community-based coalition would work at times in alliance with teachers in favor of quality education shouldn’t be surprising,” he said.
It appears the anti-tax cap groups have the upper hand in the near term. While the Senate approved the Paterson cap, the Democratic-led Assembly, concerned about the fiscal hit it could have on school finances, has shown little interest in joining the Senate or the Democratic governor.
That has its backers lashing out at NYSUT and the other groups.
“It’s ironic that people that are purported to represent working families here in New York State are trying to derail one of the most important efforts in our state right now to help working families,” said Suozzi, the tax cap commission chairman, who saw firsthand the power of the groups fighting the tax cap: Several helped Spitzer crush Suozzi in a 2006 gubernatorial primary race.
