Published December 21, 2009 (9:47 p.m.)
The WCTA Supports the WCESP

Earlier this evening, WCPS Spokesperson Mr. Richard Wright distributed a mass email to the WCPS community and to the media regarding negotiations with the Washington County Educational Support Personnel Association (“WCESP”).
The WCESP is our sister organization in Washington County. The WCESP represents 1,100 support employees, each of whom are responsible for providing the resources necessary to facilitate the education of our students and to ensure that the school system functions on a daily basis. The WCESP are essential to our community and to our students.
It is truly unfortunate that WCPS has elected to attempt an extremely reckless and misguided public “shame campaign” that is obviously designed to attack the WCESP by issuing false charges against their leadership and to “force” them to return to the negotiations table with knowingly false claims of “violations” of a negotiated contract.
The WCTA does not condone any sort of “strong-arm” tactics by any party in our public school system, regardless of any degree of merit and/or legitimacy that may inspire such tactics.
There is no merit to these claims. These tactics are shameful. They represent the absolute antonym of “world-class” and the WCTA condemns such a reprehensible act of intimidation.
The WCESP, in fact, possess a contract that spans from June 2008 through June 2012. Because the Board and the WCESP have signed this agreement, the Board is obligated to execute this contract in good faith. The WCPS has embarrassed our community with an extremely misguided interpretation of state law. Active contracts, such as the contract between the Board and the WCESP, are enforceable.
The WCESP has actively communicated with the WCPS since September 21, 2009. The WCTA resents the WCPS’ false claims that the WCESP’s contract is null and void, subject to “renegotiation”, and that the WCESP has not communicated with the WCPS.
The above record of facts are easily verifiable and the WCESP has responded to the public and to the media with tangible documents that prove the falsity of the WCPS’ malicious, hostile, and belittling accusations.
The WCTA fully supports the decisions made by WCESP. The WCTA stands by the WCESP and supports their efforts by affirming their integrity, their worth to our school system, and their commitment to the students that we educate each day.