Dandridge

Members of the Baltimore Teachers Union ousted their longtime president last night after 17 years at the helm, choosing instead a challenger who had accused the incumbent of financial mismanagement in the city's largest municipal union.Marcia Brown assumes the leadership of the BTU's teacher chapter today under union rules. Former President Irene B. Dandridge promised to help Brown through a transition period and the "rough times ahead.""The first concern for all of us is what will be good for the teachers of Baltimore City," Brown told Dandridge moments after Dandridge conceded.

On the eve of its most fiercely contested election in years, the Baltimore Teachers Union has arrived at a crossroads.The city's teachers must choose Thursday from among three candidates for president, including the incumbent of 17 years.Unlike many past sedate campaigns, this one has been marked by angry denunciations after disclosures that the BTU's longtime leaders benefited from interest-free salary advances and lucrative compensation without the knowledge of most members.Meanwhile, many of the BTU's 5,600 teachers feel that their jobs are threatened by dwindling city resources, school violence, state school reform and declining enrollment.

In a class action suit filed yesterday, a candidate for president of the Baltimore Teachers Union demanded that the union's leaders pay interest on thousands of dollars worth of salary advances they received from two labor groups in recent years.Union Presidents Irene B. Dandridge and Lorretta Johnson engaged in "financial practices that have severely damaged the unions," alleges the suit filed by Adolph McDonald on behalf of members of the teachers union and the Federation of Maryland Teachers.

Top officials of the Baltimore Teachers Union have hired two of their children as full-time employees on the small staffs of the two labor groups they control, prompting charges of nepotism ++ from opponents in an election to be held next week."

In addition to borrowing from the Baltimore Teachers Union during the past four years, its two elected presidents have received interest-free advances from an umbrella labor federation they control.Financial records obtained by The Sun show that Irene B. Dandridge and Lorretta Johnson owed money to the Federation of Maryland Teachers at the end of the last two fiscal years.Tax records show that Johnson owed the federation $2,500 in June 1994 and $143 last June. Dandridge owed $1,100 in June 1994 and $1,500 last summer, according to the tax forms.

Challengers battling the leadership of the Baltimore Teachers Union yesterday chided the group's two presidents for a "lavish" benefits package that includes $200,000 annuity premiums being paid by the union even as it is running a deficit.Marcia Brown, who is running in union elections next week against longtime BTU President Irene B. Dandridge, said that the annuities -- coupled with compensation that tops $99,000 for each woman -- are inappropriate benefits for a union representing modestly paid teachers and other school employees.

Backing away from his once-firm commitment to name teachers union President Irene B. Dandridge to the city school board, Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke said yesterday that he will wait for the results of next week's union election.In March, he had announced he would create a nonvoting position on the school board for Dandridge, as president of the Baltimore Teachers Union, to increase cooperation among school policy-makers and teachers."The mayor remains committed to a representative of the teachers union serving on the school board" but will appoint whoever is recommended by union leaders after the elections May 16, said spokesman Clinton R. Coleman.

The Baltimore Teachers Union's two presidents and other salaried employees have borrowed thousands of dollars in interest-free loans from the union's treasury since 1992.During the past four years, according to union financial records obtained by The Sun, these elected officers and employees have received more than $245,000 as salary advances to be repaid without interest.The borrowers have included Irene B. Dandridge, the teachers' elected president for the past 17 years, and Lorretta Johnson, the teacher aides' elected president for the past 25 years.

In an attempt to sidestep potential legal hurdles, Baltimore Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke yesterday modified his provocative proposal to give teachers a greater say in school policy, saying he would designate the head of the teachers union to a nonvoting seat on the school board.Giving Baltimore Teachers Union President Irene B. Dandridge ex-officio rather than full voting status could be done by a resolution of the board and would avoid legal issues raised last week after he proposed the unusual idea, the mayor said.

THERE ARE about 15,000 school boards in the United States, and no one knows of a case where a board member is also head of the local teachers union.Irene B. Dandridge wants to be the first.Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke, who appoints the nine-member Board of School Commissioners with City Council consent, has nominated Dandridge, president of the Baltimore Teachers Union, despite a City Charter stipulation that board members live in the city she lives in Columbia and despite a state statute that prohibits people from serving on boards that have authority over their jobs.