The United Federation of Teachers has moved to defend a City Council-approved $10,000 bonus for school paraprofessionals, escalating a courtroom fight with Zohran Mamdani's administration over a pay plan that would reach about 10,000 workers. The union filed a motion on August 25 saying it should be allowed to defend its members' interests as the city tries to block the law.
The filing lands because the bonus is no small side issue. The proposed pay bump would cost the city $324 million, and paraprofessionals start at $33,000 a year, rising to $56,000 after 15 years. For Mike Mulgrew, lifting the low pay of paraprofessionals who help students with disabilities has been a top priority, and the union is now pushing that case in court just as the administration is trying to stop it.
The dispute centers on the RESPECT Check Act, which passed the City Council unanimously and became law without the mayor's signature. Zohran Mamdani filed suit in Manhattan state Supreme Court last week, arguing the bonus violates state labor law because the money was approved outside the collective bargaining process that has governed public employee pay for nearly sixty years under the Taylor Law.
That is where the politics cut deepest. The UFT backed Mamdani in his election run last year, and now the union that helped carry him to office is fighting him over the same pay issue he had promised to support. Charles Moerdler, the lawyer who filed the August 25 motion, said the union should be allowed to defend the interests of its members in the proceeding.
The city says it has been talking with the UFT about a permanent fix, and Matt Rauschenbach said those talks have been productive. But the court fight now decides whether the Council's bonus survives at all or whether the city will be forced back to the bargaining table before any paraprofessional sees the extra money.
