Mike Antonucci Explains the Indiana State Teachers Association Trust’s Collapse
The state of Indiana finalized a settlement with the Indiana State Teachers Association (ISTA) in which the union will pay $14 million to 27 school districts. The settlement arose from an estimated $23 million the ISTA insurance trust owed those districts for misuse of their premiums.
ISTA issued a statement:
No members’ dues were used to fund this settlement. To protect the interest of school employees, ISTA and NEA funded litigation to sue those actually responsible for the collapse of the ISTA Trust. That litigation generated settlements in excess of $14 million, which are the sole source of the funds being used to resolve the state and school districts’ cases.
ISTA regrets that the Office of the Indiana Secretary of State has decided for political reasons to misrepresent the resolution of this case.
Even if the statement turns out to be true – and the available public documentation does not yet support it – it entirely ignores the costs of the trust’s collapse not just to ISTA members, but to NEA members across the country.
Let’s take a trip back in time to 2009, when NEA established an administratorship over ISTA and created NEA Properties, Inc. for the sole purpose of purchasing ISTA buildings and leasing them back. That resulted in a payment of more than $13.6 million from NEA to ISTA. All of that came from NEA dues money.