Bully Francesco Portelos To Be in an Anti-Bullying Film

I have, and will continue, to tell the story of Francesco Portelos and so will others.
We are not afraid of you, Mr. Portelos and Lucio Celli

Francesco Portelos and NY State Tenure Law

The UFT Solidarity Brand is Not What UFT Members Needeed

The Francesco Portelos Mob: Who Are They?

Betsy Combier

Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter

re-posted from South Bronx Blog:

Sunday, January 3, 2016

UFT Solidarity: Francesco Portelos to Be In Anti-Bullying Film

Irony-the use of words to convey a meaning that is the opposite of its literal meaning

Bully- (Noun) a blustering, quarrelsome, overbearing person who habitually badgers and intimidates smaller or weaker people. (Verb-Without Object) to act the bully toward; intimidate; domineer.

What a fun day today turned out to be! I'm not a Jets fan, so no point in me watching the game. I am a Giants fan and to sad to watch Coughlin's last game so I was praying for something to give me some high spirits and/or a laugh today. And I got it. In Facebook. On the Don't Tread on Educators page. Let's have a looksee (Click to enlarge).

The "movie" is called "When Bullies Become Bosses" produced by Brett Culp and Richard Santiago (link to trailer here) that comes with a website and Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and blogpages as well as an email.

Hey, we here at SBSB fully support the work of Brett and Richard and wish them well and Godspeed in their endeavor! It's just that The Crack Team wishes that they were more informed of things and should be aware that there could be a sub-title to their film...something like, "When Bullies Think They Are Becoming Self-Professed Union Bosses" are something akin to that.

Before we here at SBSB go on an share what reasonable people but construe as bullying, let's think of this.

There are far, far, more vile and disgusting stories than Portelos' of bullied teachers in the City of New York. We here at SBSB are officially calling for Portelos to put the tiny violin away. It's time. Or as one SBSB groupie just shared with us here;

Big ego talking..that Portelos ego. He thinks that if he screams the loudest, he is fierce. So many other teachers who would be better fit for an interview for a documentary. This just feeds his insatiable ego.

Speaking of egos, could a reasonable person safely assume that the persistent haranguing of members of MORE, through texts and emails, is not supposed to be seen as intimidating? Can this in turn be reasonably seen as bullying? Or as Norm Scott has written (not confidential, any and all conversations I share are either with permission or gleamed from comments of my blog);

It is your leader - the guy you have chosen to run for president who constantly trolls around ICE and MORE - and sends email after email. Why? If you have such a dynamic and influential group go forth and organize people but leave us alone. But your chosen leader can't seem to do that. He is selling you on the idea that if we all don't jump on the bandwagon we can't beat Unity. he is selling you the bridge...He had to show up at the MORE meeting today - and for a group that does nothing the fact that almost 60 people showed on a hot summer afternoon - many of them new and current chapter leaders and delegates who came to get some training and info. That is the kind of work MORE does - and we emphasized chapter leader support for ATRS. Portelos just can't seem to stay away from MORE or ICE. (Was he there to try to poach people who came to MORE for himself?)

Can the administrator of a Facebook page when finally fed up with Portelos' ego and bogarting of said page, not see Portelos as a bully? When said administrator's personal, confidential conversations, with Portelos be made public by Portelos when he had he the administrator toy taken away been seen as bullying? Is this not a mode of intimidation?

Or when I wrote this piece, "Why I Can't Support UFT Solidarity" in which it is exposed how Portelos bullies not just myself, but Principals as well? What he wrote, could it be safe for me, as well as my family, to assume that I am being bullied when Portelos wrote this fiction and having to use my family against me (Click to enlarge)?

What about this post, "Is There Solidarity With God," in which the comments kept me laughing my ass off as my wife read them to me driving home from Corning NY (Click to enlarge)?

Is this bullying/intimidation? It is a Portelos fantasy (click to enlarge).

Can the last line of this be considered a threat or intimidation/bullying (click to enlarge)?

Or as Norm Scott wrote on this thread;

I have 75 pages of notes on the Portelos trial and 25 on Peter's. One day I'll write a book. All I'll say here is that at no point at Peter's hearing did I hear one word that would make me think he could be evil. He would never go after someone's family. At theother hearing I heard more than one instance of retaliation against families of people on the "enemies" list, stories that made many of the observers shake their heads. Observers and supporters by the way who mostly came from the ranks of MORE/ICE. How soon people forget.

Or what shall we say about this blog post, the one in which Portelos feels he must mock James Eterno.? And Portelos subsequently harangued to no end the person who shared this information with me.

To catch those who don't understand what is being said, XXXXXXX XXXXXXXX has claimed that James Eterno is nothing more than a chef, probably a failed chef at that when what we need as a union is one who manages a 5 star restaurant. XXXXXXX XXXXXXXX believes that only such a manager can right the sinking ship of the UFT. But questions persist.

And lest we forget the post, "The UFT Solidarity Circus Comes to Town" (I love that meme I created!) where I am threatened with a lawsuit. As wont a bully to do (Click to enlarge);

Cease and desist? Still, it is the wrong county! Please see my post, "Welcome to White Plains."

Or what about this post, "UFT Solidarity Threatens to Sue Me!", in which a reasonable person can construe it as intimidation by a bully?

And of course, there is more (Click to enlarge)....

OH, I could go on and on but I shan't. I just wanted to share the hits. I can't share what has been confided to me either verbally or through email, due to my own ethics and morals, without gaining prior approval of those who shared with me. I need to look at myself in the mirror.

If these people want to use Portelos in their movie that is their right. I, and others, have every right to disagree with Portelos being used as a victim of bullying for several reasons; 1) In retrospect, what happened to Portelos is pretty benign. It was wrong, but there have been and continue to be, much worse instances of teachers being bullied and victimized; 2) He has, in many others opinions, gone from the bullied to the bullier, and 3) His fight is not about others but has always been about himself.

This is how I feel and many others feel. Portelos is not a leader. He should not, will not, be the leader of the UFT.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Portelos is like a 4th grader... that age when all of the girls are physically way past the boys in development and he's desperately trying to catch up.January 3, 2016 at 6:27 PM
Anonymous said...

Your blog is an important site for truly understanding the true character of Francesco Portelos and the Solidarity Caucus.

--a former ally of Francesco.January 6, 2016 at 8:27 PM
Anonymous said...

South Bronx, you need a special post just on this one: Portelos, the pro-Apartheid union caucus leader.

Ed Notes said that Francesco is of the pro-apartheid caucus.
so of course I had to check out the comments. And FOR REAL, Francesco Portelos really said it. He belittled the opposition to apartheid. Portelos, the leader without a brain or a heart. If you oppose opposing apartheid, logically, you are either favoring or condoning apartheid.

Here are his comments so that there is no mistaking for context:

Francesco Portelos said...

Great post Chaz. You were at our initial meetings and involved in our early communications. We respect your decision to remain independent.

I can see how from the outside it appears to be a one person show, but I assure you, and I'm very proud to say, it's a team effort. After being ignored by the Social Justice caucus, and NAC not knowing what they were doing for election, we had a proposal and vote according to our bylaws. 54 people at the time voted to run in the election and for the first three candidates.

Since then our group is officially at 116 and decisions are made according to our bylaws. Our support numbers much larger of course.

We exist because the other caucuses fall very short of addressing the issues of the membership. For example the last time MORE had an initiative against an administrator was in 2013. Of course that was because the principal made racist remarks.

Besides raising a resolution for ATRs, MORE has done little for ATR issues. To contrast, 5 of the 6 ATR Alliance reps are Solidarity members. When we sent emails to MORE to help advertise for ATR meetings, they were ignored. Same for discontinued teachers and same for rallies outside abusive schools. They took, and still take, the ostrich approach.

Remember, not only was I a member of MORE, but sat on steering for two terms. What a nightmare. The infighting was and I hear still is ridiculous.

Solidarity is a true caucus. Meaning "a group of people with shared concerns within a political party or larger organization." MORE is a melting pot of very left, slightly left, not left at all, but just not Unity. When MORE members and I had enough in August September of 2014, we created Solidarity. A few got cold feet and still remain in MORE to this day.

They want democracy, but told New Action that only MORE can choose the presidential candidate. Now that's democracy.

Some in MORE have a life goal of "one united caucus." One group is also absent of democracy.

When New Action first published the New Action/MORE coalition, the first thing they mentioned was that NAC was the original social justice caucus. I'm not making this up, but the first initiative mentioned by NAC was their fight against apartheid. Apartheid? That's how you're going to reach the twenty five year old members?

Solidarity wrote a response to this new coalition, but we never published it. We realized..."no one cared."

7:09 AMJanuary 6, 2016 at 9:51 PM
Non-fiction Filmmaker said...

If anyone think Mr. Portelo is not the right man for our film. You are more then welcome to call my office and talk to the director himself. At 413.370.2400 or email him at: DIRECTOR@theBULLYexposed.comJanuary 9, 2016 at 7:23 PM
Non-fiction Filmmaker said...

Use the email DIRECTOR@theBULLYexposed.net. Both are good but I will get this email faster. I am waiting and welcome all emails.January 10, 2016 at 12:30 AM
Skye Karley said...

It's time me for use to come together as victims of workplace bullying. Not fight each other.January 10, 2016 at 12:36 AM

Carmen Farina Does It Again: Scams The Public To Profit "Friends"

NYC Chancellor Carmen Farina

When Carmen Farina gave favors to Lee McCaskill and Diana Lam, the public was kept out of the loop until the media finally threw politics aside and did the stories. Carmen was told, my sources tell me, to either "retire" or "be fired".

Carmen retired to her home in Brooklyn, and started currying favors for Bill de Blasio. When Bill became Mayor, many of us media-parents-advocates who knew all about Carmen's weakness for using her position of power as a "friend with benefits" and giving favors to trusted co-workers, tried to convince him NOT to pick Carmen Farina as Chancellor, but we knew it was a done deal. Bill de Blasio is a "friend with benefits" to many people. We all remember the case of Reverend Orlando Findlayter, don't we? Bill not only gave him favors, but called his friends at the police to get him out of jail. Nice. Anyone with a computer can see that New York City and New York State government runs on political favors and cronyism. Our government is founded on the rights of the rich to pay whomever is in office to do what they - the wealthy - want. No pay, no play.

Sometimes politicians get caught. See the stories of Sheldon Silver and Dean Skelos, just for starters.

I betcha Carmen Farina has many secret payoffs that the media has not found out about yet, or are holding out of the public eye, but we do know how she violated the rules and laws of New York City to put Brooklyn Tech's former Principal Lee Mc Caskill's young daughter into a District 15 public school even though McCaskill lived in New Jersey; and we know how she allowed Diana Lam's husband to get a job without telling the Conflict of Interest Board. See the SCI Report.

See the following stories (some of many):
The Arrogence of Immunity and the "Resignation" -or Retirement - 

of NYC DOE Deputy Chancellor Carmen Farina

http://www.parentadvocates.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6921

Carmen Farina: Politics Wins With Her Appointment as Deputy Chancellor in New York City

Former Deputy Chancellor Carmen Farina Retired Because of Her Complicity With the McCaskill Wrongdoing
http://www.parentadvocates.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=6971

Steve Ostrin And The NYC Rubber Room Scam

Despite Too Many Questions of Improprieties, Carmen Farina is Named Deputy Chancellor For the New York City DOE

http://www.parentadvocates.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=article&articleID=3750

Mayor Bloomberg's Diana Lam Problem

Carmen Farina: The Problem With Her Being Chancellor of the NYC School System Is.......

and, I saw first hand how she wields her magic wand towards people she favors, as well as how she destroys people who confront her about her wrongdoing.

And now we know about Patricia Peterson.

Carmen Farina

Carmen Farina and the 'beautiful day' blizzard

Patricia Peterson

Bill, isn't it time for you to terminate Carmen, or put her back into "retirement" with her double pension?

Do it. Now.

Betsy Combier
Editor, NYC Rubber Room Reporter
Editor, Parentadvocates.org

Carmen Fariña’s cronyism exposes her real ‘education agenda’

It helps to be in the good graces of the king — or, in this case, the queen

By Post Editorial Board

As Yoav Gonen reported in Wednesday’s Post, Carmen Fariña has spent years handing out job opportunities to Patricia Peterson, the daughter of a close Fariña friend.

Peterson got three promotions between 2002 and 2005, when Fariña was a superintendent and deputy chancellor under then-Chancellor Joel Klein. Fariña pushed two of the promotions — and created the position for the third.

Peterson’s salary jumped from $57,000 to $97,000 over that time — and her “luck” continues: She now pulls in $118,000 for a DOE administrative job under Chancellor Fariña.

For 18 months of that three-year period, Peterson lacked a state teaching certificate. Yet she still moved up to interim assistant principal at PS 58 in Carroll Gardens.

The principal told The Post that Fariña’s staff demanded the position be made permanent — never mind the license problem.

Peterson later left PS 58 — just in time (as Gonen reports today) to avoid questions about her role in the leaking of answers to state tests. She became a Gifted and Talented coordinator — the position Fariña carved out for her. And when her license problem popped up, DOE officials backdated the hire to an “interim” posting.

Peterson and DOE deny any wrongdoing — but the details speak for themselves.

Sheltering a family friend on the public payroll is nothing new, but this sorry tale is ample proof of Carmen Fariña’s real education agenda: It’s not about the kids.

The Farina-Mulgrew-de-Blasio Triumvirate Put Tenured Teachers Into Rubber Rooms On The Public Dime Without Accountability

Steve Ostrin and UFT Howie Schoor in front of 25 Chapel Street, Brooklyn

Disbursement of taxpayer money is supposed to be public information, and if the money is not spent correctly, those who steal, embezzle, or swindle the public must be held accountable for their actions. The three people in the picture below think the issue of accountability is a joke.

UFT Pres. Mike Mulgrew, Chancellor Carmen Farina, Mayor Bill de Blasio

Re-posted from Parentadvocates.org:

The New York City RubberRoom Anti-Teacher Charging Process Shows How Corrupt the Carmen Farina-Bill DeBlasio Department of Education Really Is. by Betsy Combier

 

David Pakter with Rudy Giuliani

          

From the first time that I was invited into the rubber room at 25 Chapel Street in 2003 by David Pakter, I understood that the charging  process and rubber room placement, and 3020-a hearing process - which I shortened to the rubber room process - was a massive fraud on the public.

The problem stems from the fact that there is no accountability in this process, therefore anyone can charge someone with anything and make him/her guilty without having any repercussions for the charging agent's life or career (I call these agents "The Gotcha Squad"). See here and here.

In New York City, an administrator who reassigns a teacher after claiming he/she is guilty of either valid or false charges is given the same rewards: financial, because the person is taken off of the school budget sooner or later; personal, because the person is no longer in the same building and the "problems" this person supposedly caused are stopped; professional, because there may be some concerns about the principal's actions which the charged teacher could reveal, and now is out of the way, gone from the premises, and far from parents and other staff at the school.

In sum, there are many rewards to putting a tenured teacher in a rubber room, or in the rubber room process for 3020-a charges, and no consequences for making false claims against him/her. Truth be damned. Did you read Lord of the Flies and don't you see similarities?

When you are not held accountable for your acts, and you dislike someone, then using public funds to hurt that person causes you no sweat. Many people steal or misuse public funds all the time, and who cares? US Attorney Preet Bharara cant investigate everyone, and as far as I know he has never looked into the past lives of NYC DOE Chancellor Carmen Farina and her husband Tony.

Every so often, a reporter pops up with a rubber room story, but the story makes it look like the teachers imprisoned in the room/process are responsible for some kind of wrong-doing. Why is that? NYC media is not neutral. This is what happened in David Suker's case and many others.

I have written in several articles posted on this website and on my blog, saying that I was lucky to have been involved in holding the New York City Department of Education accountable for the outrageous attack on tenured teacher David Suker. Since 2003 I have been involved in hundreds of cases where tenured teachers were not allowed, by the Department OR BY THEIR OWN REPRESENTATIVE from the UFT or NYSUT, to defend him or herself. This is a terrible system and the NY State legislature should have stepped in years ago, and made accountability part of each step along the way.

None exist.

I cant help but think about the hundreds of thousands of public dollars which have been thrown away on lawyers' fees (1) to the NYC DOE preparing the case against David; (2) to all the lawyers who worked with the Gotcha Squad attorneys Nancy Ryan, Eleanor Glanstein and Theresa Europe, just to name the main players; (3) to all the people who work at the New York City Law Department and participated in opposing David's Article 75 Appeal to the New York State Supreme Court, (4) to all the lawyers who worked on the Appeal by the City to the First Department Appellate Division; (5) for the salary of the second Arbitrator. So much money to keep David in a vortex of injustice!

David Suker sitting in a rubber room

David Suker has conquered New York City's bizarre Department of Education Rubber room process and is now laughing all the way to the bank. I am overjoyed at his outcome, but disgusted that we, the public have to pay for the rubber room process while children go without books, extra-curricular programs, music, and art, etc., etc.

There is a better way.

Betsy Combier

City pays exiled teachers to snooze as ‘rubber rooms’ return
By Susan Edelman NY POST, January 17, 2016
LINK

David Suker
sleeping in his RR

The city’s infamous rubber rooms have rebounded.

In one of the “reassignment centers,” (Note: Alan Rosenfeld died several months ago - Ed.) 16 exiled educators sit in a city Department of Education building in Long Island City, Queens, including a dozen packed into one room — where they do virtually no work.

They listen to music, do crossword puzzles, chat — and as this exclusive Post photo reveals, doze on the taxpayer’s dime.

The rules forbid beach chairs and air mattresses, but not nap time. The teacher sprawled on the floor, pulled a wool hat over his eyes to shut out the fluorescent lights and slept.

Others prop up two chairs to recline or just lay their heads on the table. “It’s gone right back to the way it was in the old days, an old-fashioned rubber room,” one banished teacher said.

Despite the photographic evidence and teacher testimony to the contrary, the city denies the existence of the derided holding pens. “There are no more rubber rooms,” DOE officials told The Post last week, saying reassigned staffers are given “administrative duties.”

In 2010, the DOE and the teachers union trumpeted a major agreement to close the centers holding more than 700 idled educators accused of misconduct or incompetence.

Many teachers settled charges by paying fines and finally returned to classrooms, while those still expelled were scattered across the five boroughs. But the rubber room deal is routinely violated. “No one pays any attention to the agreement,” said Betsy Combier, a veteran paralegal who helps defend teachers.

The DOE refused to say how many removed teachers and other tenured staffers remain in limbo, but sources estimate 200 to 400 get paid while awaiting disciplinary hearings. Their salaries total $15 million to $20 million a year.

The Long Island City castoffs begin their day by reading newspapers, then turn on the radio. They get 45 minutes to leave for lunch. They chat and sometimes exercise to “relieve the stress.”

While the city promised to keep removed educators busy, the Queens exiles say they only occasionally oblige requests to do menial tasks like stuffing folders or making copies. Others refuse to do such work, calling it “demeaning.”

They mainly just kill time to get through a six-hour, 20-minute day.

“I’m so exhausted from being in this place doing nothing,” one said.

Several teachers on the payroll have been benched for up to five years due to a stunning bureaucratic breakdown. The 2010 deal required the independent arbitrators who conduct termination trials to issue a decision 30 days after a hearing, so that vindicated teachers could return to work and bad ones could be axed.

But decisions still come months — or even years — late. The DOE says it can’t enforce the rule.

“They’re just letting me sit here,” said a teacher removed from the classroom nearly five years ago on charges of physically abusing children, which he denies. His trial ended four years ago. He makes about $70,000 a year.

Social Studies teacher David Suker has sat in the rubber room since September 2015, even though a state Supreme Court judge overturned his termination. Suker, an Army vet who taught at-risk kids in The Bronx, was found guilty of failing to immediately report his arrest in the Occupy Wall Street protests but was finally fined just $7,000.

After The Post asked why the DOE had not put Suker back to work, officials on Friday assigned him to a school as a substitute.

Rubber-room bosses thought napping on the job was hilarious: teacher
By Susan Edelman, Priscilla DeGregory and Beckie Strum, NY POST, January 18, 2016

Rubber-room supervisors find it hilarious that teachers are dozing on the taxpayer dime, says social-studies teacher David Suker — and he should know, he’s the instructor shown sleeping “on the job” on the front page of Sunday’s Post.

“They would walk in and would laugh or joke about it,” Suker told The Post.

He sat at one of these so-called Department of Education “reassignment centers” from September until last Friday after a state Supreme Court judge overturned his termination for not immediately reporting to higher-ups his arrest in the Occupy Wall Street protests.

“They clearly knew I was sleeping, and they never told me not to do it,” said Suker, 47, who provided The Post with a picture of himself napping, he said, in order to expose the do-nothing rooms, which the city insists no longer exist.

“People were sleeping every day,” said Suker, who said nap time is a daily routine for most of the city educators hauled up into rubber rooms, meant for teachers accused of incompetence or misconduct. The Department of Education said rubber rooms were discontinued over five years ago.

Most choose to snooze in their chairs or with their heads on the desks, he explained.

“There was also one person that would go to the bathroom and fall asleep on the toilet,” Suker said. “He needed his privacy.”

Suker, an Army vet who taught at-risk kids in The Bronx, says he was one of three who would practice their A-B-Z’s on the grubby carpet.

“I was in the infantry, and that was just how we dealt with the stresses of that lifestyle. You grab some sleep whenever you can get it,” said Suker, who said his preferred nap time was after lunch.

“It’s mentally grueling to be in a room and have nothing to do. You look for any escape you can get. Some of the only ones you can get are going to the bathroom or going to sleep,” said Suker, who likened the rubber room to being in prison.

“But at least in prison you only have one or two roommates,” he said.

He said more than a dozen others are crammed into a tiny room, two or three to a desk, being punished for minor infractions, such as showing up a minute past 8 a.m.