Politics on the Hudson

   New York State United Teachers, the state’s largest teachers union, spent more than $162 million in 2005-06 on items ranging from retreats at luxury resorts to a fleet of automobiles valued at more than $1 million, according to the Foundation for Education Reform and Accountability, which said it analyzed data available through the U.S. Department of Labor.

   “The amount of money spent by the teachers union in one year for conferences, entertainment and other perks and parts of its operations could have been used to hire more than 4,200 new teachers for New York’s public schools,” said Jason Brooks of the foundation, an education policy think-tank based in Albany.

   The union, which collected more than $87 million in dues, spent $192,596 for photography and $31,000 for limosine bus service. NYSUT’s headquarters and conference center cost $3.2 million for the year.

   NYSUT, which has a conference center in its headquarters, paid nearly $3.2 million in 2005-06 for meetings and conferences, including the following, according to Brooks:

  —$351,345 at Gurney’s Inn Resort & Spa in Montauk;

  —$282,819 at the Desmond in Colonie;

  —$188,334 at the four-diamond rated Otesaga Resort Hotel in Cooperstown;

   Union spokesman Carl Korn said the foundation’s analysis of the expenses is incorrect. Teachers who attend conferences write checks to NYSUT for the cost, and the union then pays the hotel or conference center. The limosine service was for buses to transport union members.

   Korn said he believes the foundation’s report is in retaliation for a recent NYSUT report critical of charter schools. The foundation favors increasing the number of charter schools allowed in New York. There is a cap of 100, which the state reached in January.

   “They followed up a factual report by taking a filing (with the Labor Department) and put it in the worst possible light,” Korn said.

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