The West Virginia teachers strike is ending … probably. Tuesday night, Gov. Jim Justice announced a deal for the teachers to get a five percent pay raise, with other state workers getting three percent. But, NPR reported, “it remains unknown whether leaders of the House and Senate will go along with the deal.” And it’s not clear that the teachers were satisfied, either. Health care was a key issue in their strike, and that remains unresolved, though Justice promised a task force to work on it.
State Sen. Richard Ojeda also expressed skepticism that the promised five percent raise would ever materialize, saying “Until I see a bill that is on paper that is going through the House and the Senate, it’s an empty promise.”
So we’ll see. Getting a Republican governor to back down to the extent that Justice did is a remarkable show of power by the teachers—but there are serious issues unresolved, and the follow-through on what they’ve been promised will tell the real story.