By SHERRY HALBROOK It’s difficult to imagine more challenging work than educating youngsters who are blind, deaf, mentally retarded, developmentally disabled or all of the above. So, you might think the state would recognize and want to reward the enormous skill and dedication of its professional staff at the state School for the Blind in Batavia and the School for the Deaf in Rome. Sadly, that doesn’t appear to be the case. PEF has faced tough resistance from the state in negotiating a contract for PEF-represented employees in unclassified titles at the schools. Their previous agreement expired April 1, 1999. Although staff in jobs with civil-service classifications at the schools are already covered by the 1999-2004 PS&T contract, the unclassified staff are covered by a local agreement between PEF and the state which usually tracks the main PS&T pact in many respects. “The main obstacle to a tentative agreement is the employer’s refusal to give the instructors at the schools the same benefits given to all other PEF-represented state teachers — removing the delay in receiving performance advances retroactive to September 2000 and an option for all full-time school employees to keep their health insurance during the summer,” says PEF Director of Labor Relations Roger Scales. It makes the nearly 125 unclassified staff feel like second-class employees, instead of the top-notch experts they are in educating and serving the special needs of the youngsters in their care. “This bargaining unit includes such unclassified titles as psychologist, audiologist, instructor, instructor assistant and habilitation program assistant,” said PEF associate counsel Elizabeth Hough, the union’s chief negotiator at the bargaining table. “The educators have certain tenure rights, similar to provisions under state Education Law, and they have a different salary structure than classified staff,” Hough said. “Our members are very depressed,” said Deborah Cromwell-Stamp, council leader of PEF Division 298 at the School for the Blind, “We feel we don’t matter to the state Education Department or to the Governor’s Office of Employee Relations,” she said. “At least, we know that we certainly matter to the children. It’s their smiles that keep us going.”
	PEF Contract Justice Rally May 2, 3:15 p.m. • NYS School for the Deaf, — Rome — • NYS School for the Blind, — Batavia —