Living in New England I have the unfortunate pleasure of living like many Floridians and Carolinians, in that my area of the country was directly hit by Hurricane Sandy. So far the power has been out since mid-Monday with no real hopes of regaining electricity (which also translates into cable, internet, heat, hot water, etc.) until this coming Monday at best. I’m not really complaining too much, it happens, it’s life. However, many areas of my town does have power, including all three elementary schools (K-4) and the high-school (9-12), but the kids aren’t back at school yet. Why? you ask. Because the intermediate school (5-8) is still without power.
One would think you’d open the schools for the kids whose schools are up and running, if for nothing else but to keep them warm and get them fed. One would think that, but one would be wrong.
I’d bet all the money I could borrow that the reason the school district is still closed is because the salaried teacher’s union for the district would not allow some, and not all teachers to go back to work. Having been a member of a government employee’s union my entire adult working life, I know that if some teachers were permitted (read: forced) to return to work, the teachers whose school is closed due to power outages would still be paid, because we all know it’s everyone or no one. And I can hear it now, “Oh no, if they’re going to be paid and not work, I’m not going to work just to make the same as them who aren’t working!”
These are the kinds of problems public employee unions create. Thousands of households without power, heat, hot food, etc. and all the schools remain closed because one school in particular isn’t ready to re-open.
This is also how I know when teachers strike because their normal raise isn’t large enough, or they may be *gasp* forced to contribute to their own retirement or health insurance, and they try to get the public they’re all about the kids, they’re selling bridges. Spare me. I know better.
Sifting Reality 
I hope life gets back to normal for your folks soon, John. Damn awful to be without electricity, heat, and such in the colder months, especially when you have children.
Luckily our home regained power last night around 9:00pm. So while I have power, the intermediate school still does not. This and tomorrow’s post I wrote at the public library last night. In all we were without power for about 3 1/2 days, half the time in the dark as when Irene hit. It felt worse this time around though for some reason. I suspect its because the power company spent a good amount of time bragging how prepared they were and that the effects would be minimal. I guess its a matter of perspective.