General Membership Meeting

August 29, 2006

NOTE: These minutes are also available online at www.lmeaonline.org.

President D. Pendino called the meeting to order at 10:12 AM.

P. Peterson made motion made to approve the May 2006 General Membership Meeting minutes. Second by C. SantaMaria. - Approved.

D. Pendino asked for a moment of silence for Joy Fitzpatrick who recently passed away. Joy was a former officer and committee member for the LMEA, secretary at Merion, and friend to many.

Officer’s Reports:

VP Support: V. Fedeli welcomed all members back and thanked those responsible for their hard work getting the schools and campuses ready over the summer. Job Descriptions are still coming but we have not received any yet. When we receive job descriptions, several members in each job will meet and discuss the description provided then submit a response to the District. Anyone interested in assisting in these discussions should contact Victor.

1 st Vice President: NR

VP Professional: NR

Secretary Support: NR

Secretary Professional: NR

Treasurer: D. Mandarino made motion to approve the Treasurer’s report – Approved.

Committee Reports:

Constitution: NR

Elections: NR

IPD: NR

CNC: NR

FAC: NR

Health & Safety: NR

Legislation: NR

Minority Affairs : NR

PACE: C. SantaMaria reported on the PACE program. PACE stands for Political Action Committee for Education and is funded to support political candidates who support public education. As public school employees our jobs, pensions, and bargaining rights are directly tied to legislators. With NCLB, referenda legislation, Act 48, etc. it is vitally important to support candidate who support us. Legislators unfriendly to public education are campaigning hard for re-election. As an example, Rick Santorum’s campaign is spending about $1 million per week. In several weeks members will be asked again to contribute to this worthwhile program. There are a variety of easy ways to contribute. Last year BCMS had over 60% of their staff participate and the LMEA collected about $10,000 and we would like to exceed that total this year. PACE contribution forms will be coming out soon.

PR&R: NR

Public Relations: NR

Social: NR

Special Services: NR

Sunshine: NR

Membership: NR

CARE: NR

President’s Report: D. Pendino welcomed everyone back and announced this will be his last year as LMEA President. Dom made some observations of changes in policy over his career here at LM. Among these he noted students at one time had to mostly adapt to teachers, now it is the teachers adapting to the needs of the students. Also, he noted the administration has become more ‘advisory’ and much less collaborative than in the past. Dom also briefly summarized the status of current/recent grievances. The workload, child-rearing, and FMLA grievances have all been settled. A grievance on evaluations is pending. The hall duty, ISS, and parent contact grievances are ongoing.

New Business: Question about mechanics’ night work and second shift – assignments are being done based on seniority – will be investigated.

A. Flicker made motion to adjourn, second by P. Dawson. The meeting was adjourned at 10:40 AM.

Respectfully submitted,

Michael Stettner, Secretary