Another fight is brewing between Detroit Public Schools and the teachers union.
The American Federation of Teachers wants to send out its own teams of health inspectors to the current building inspections, but the district isn’t allowing it..
Now that DPS Emergency Manager Darnell Earley is resigning, the union is attempting to get more involved in fixing DPS. Earley is still the acting emergency manager until Feb. 26 and is telling the union there is no reason for it to get involved.
The Detroit Federation of Teachers is suing the school district demanding building fixes among other others. The district wants an end to the sick-outs. They’re going to court over the disputes.
“We have to make sure that when we make repairs, the repairs are the correct repairs and that it’s a long-term solution, not just a patchwork,” said Ivy Bailey, interim president of the Detroit Federation of Teachers. “We don’t want to put Band-Aids on this anymore.”
But the district is saying no.
“Additional teams of people in the school buildings complicate the district’s efforts to fully comply with state and local regulations,” the emergency manager’s office told Local 4 in a statement. “Further, the DFT/AFT were seeking to have teams of unknown individuals come into our school buildings without proper of reasonable prior notice to administration and staff.”
The DFT filed a motion to get its own inspectors into the school buildings as part of the inspections.
“The DPS and DFT can work together to solve these issues and we can work together to move things forward,” Ivy said.