Impasse

In an unusual maneuver, Temple University officials declared an impasse yesterday in their talks with striking faculty and announced that they would implement the terms of their last offer. Officials of the Temple Association of University Professionals (TAUP), whose strike is entering a record 20th day today, immediately denounced the step as illegal and an attempt to entice strikers to cross the picket lines. "They are doing everything to break this strike and spending all their energy trying to break this strike - intimidating and coercing people to come back - instead of negotiating," said Arthur Hochner, TAUP president.

An impasse between the only two members of the Audubon Commission resulted in no action being taken last night on a number of reappointments to borough positions. The two members are Mayor Stanley Mojta and Commissioner Jane Merryfield, and the agenda for the meeting included reappointments to several township offices, including teasurer, borough solicitor and purchasing agent. However, Merryfield declined to make a motion for approval for any of the reappointments. Although the borough commission normally consists of three members, no replacement has been named to fill the seat vacated when Vincent Lobascio resigned in November.

The agent for Adam "Pacman" Jones said negotiations reached an impasse yesterday for Tennessee's top draft pick, news that caught the Titans' general manager by surprise. "I don't think I've ever seen this," Floyd Reese said. "So this one's kind of new. I've only been doing this for 30 years, and this is the first time the press got an e-mail and the GM didn't. " Agent Michael Huyghue flew into town Thursday hoping to conclude a contract for the sixth pick overall and the first defensive player taken in the draft.

Helen E. Krieble is founder and president of the Vernon K. Krieble Foundation in Denver The power brokers in Congress have decided to take the summer off from the debate about how to secure America's borders and deal with the millions of people in the United States illegally. The only results from their vacation will be a still-unsolved problem, several thousand more illegals sneaking across the border, and the continued frustration of a public that does not find the issue so complicated.

Commissioner David Stern is hoping sheer dynamics will create a breakthrough in the NBA labor impasse. That is because the 23 player representatives are meeting tonight in Chicago with their general counsel, Larry Fleisher. The owners are meeting tomorrow morning. "I'm hoping the meetings will stir things up to a point that will get us back to discussions," said Stern, at the Sixers-Pacers game last night to participate in an anti-drug campaign with Nancy Reagan. The league and the NBA Players Association have been without a collective bargaining agreement since the final game of last season's playoffs.

Talks between striking dockworkers and port employers hit a snag early today, when union leaders walked out of the talks, saying they were at an impasse. "Apparently, they don't want a contract," Lucien Blackwell, president of International Longshoremen's Association Local 1332, said as he emerged from the talks at 2:20 a.m. But Blackwell and other leaders returned to the bargaining table about 30 minutes later, summoned by martime negotiators who said they had a new proposal for them to consider.

Neither threats nor decisions were made last night when about 130 people, most of them school staff members, attended a Pitman school board meeting to protest their prolonged contract negotiations. "After five meetings with the board, we are at an impasse in our negotiations," said the lone speaker from the audience, Carol Fox, president of the 150-member Pitman Education Association. Board President Kathleen W. Benash said the two sides entered mediation last week through the state's Public Employees Commission.

Eastern Regional High School teachers and school board representatives will meet Sept. 2 with a state mediator to try to break an impasse in contract negotiations, officials said at the board's meeting last night. The contract for the Eastern Education Association, which represents about 100 teachers and 25 support staff members, expired June 30. A second day of mediation, if needed, has been set for Sept. 6. Orientation for freshmen and teachers is scheduled Sept. 6, and regular classes are set to begin Sept.

An impasse has been declared in contract talks between the police and Radnor Township, and a three-member arbitration panel on Monday will begin reviewing proposals to find a solution. The police are asking for a one-year contract with an 8.5 percent wage increase and improvements in pension. The township is offering a three-year contract with wage increases of 3 to 4 percent each year. The decision by the arbitration panel will be binding on both parties. Under the current two-year contract, which expires Dec. 31, the starting salary for a police officer is $25,466 a year.

Imagine what a mediator would say if he were brought in to settle a very serious problem facing Philadelphia: getting past the months-long impasse that has delayed construction of a new youth detention facility. The Youth Study Center temporarily houses youngsters that the judicial process has found guilty of a serious crime. They are there until a spot in a long-term juvenile detention or behavioral treatment center is found for them. A new Youth Study Center is a must. The building on Callowhill Steet is going to be demolished to make way for the Barnes Foundation art collection, which is moving from Lower Merion to Philadelphia.

The Phillies are back, with high hopes and a couple big question marks named Utley and Howard. The Flyers have made it into the National Hockey League playoffs, and the Sixers are fighting to secure a postseason slot. Another Philadelphia April is halfway gone. If you're a sports fan and a cable subscriber, you could have caught much of this winter and spring's action on Comcast SportsNet, which carries a majority of this city's baseball, hockey and basketball games. But you still can't watch most of your local teams' games on Dish Network or DirecTV — unlike almost everywhere else in the country.

There's no middle ground when it comes to Ritchie Webb. Take, for example, last month's Neshaminy school board meeting. As Webb took his seat as president, half the packed crowd rose and cheered; the remainder jeered and chanted, "Negotiate. " Webb has stood center stage in the district's bitter and polarizing contract impasse for four years - the longest-running standoff in the state, with no end in sight. To his supporters, he is "a hero," "cunning," and "fair. " His critics call him a union-buster who refuses to negotiate in good faith with the 654-member Neshaminy Federation of Teachers.

ON MONDAY, the NBA Players Association formally rejected the NBA owners' most recent offer and unanimously agreed to dissolve the union and take the owners to court. The decision virtually guarantees a protracted legal battle and places the 2011-2012 season on the verge of disaster. As this news settles into my brain, and with games already canceled through at least Dec. 15, I feel overcome by a range of emotions. As someone who studies inequality, I can't help but resist the popular "billionaires vs. millionaires" narrative that has been attached to the labor dispute.

NEW YORK - For now, the talk of Basketball Related Income can be put on hold. Forget, for a bit, about hard or flexible salary caps, about long-term contracts or system and spending restrictions. For that matter, you might want to forget about seeing professional basketball for what might be an extended amount of time, maybe even the entire 2011-12 season. Yesterday in a small, overcrowded meeting room on the second floor of the Westin Hotel in Times Square, union executive Billy Hunter and a group of about 50 players merrily entered.

The Neshaminy School District teachers' union has lowered its contract proposal, but the district still "doesn't have the money to pay those kind of increases," School Board President Richie Webb said Tuesday. Webb said he released what he said was the union's latest offer because the Neshaminy Federation of Teachers (NFT) did not produce it in writing as was promised at last week's negotiating session. "We wanted it in writing so we didn't misunderstand or miscommunicate it," he said.

WASHINGTON - In the impasse over funding the Federal Aviation Administration, which had idled more than 4,000 FAA employees and 70,000 construction workers for nearly two weeks, only one Republican sided with the Democrats: Texas' Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison. And in the end, Hutchison, the ranking member of the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee, was given credit for helping to work out a deal, announced yesterday, that will settle the dispute. "She has played an extraordinary leadership role," said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood, himself a former Republican congressman who's now serving a Democratic administration.

WASHINGTON - The Senate adjourned without resolving a funding standoff that has left the Federal Aviation Administration in partial shutdown for more than a week. The failure came despite a flurry of last-minute activity Tuesday and urgings from President Obama that the standoff be resolved. Obama called it "another Washington-inflicted wound on America. " But with Congress not expected to return until September, 4,000 "nonessential" FAA employees are likely to remain furloughed without pay and many more employees of private contractors will be without work.

WASHINGTON - Executives from 20 of the country's biggest banks met with U.S. Treasury officials Friday to discuss how debt auctions will be handled if Congress fails to raise the government's borrowing limit before Tuesday's deadline. Those banks serve as primary dealers for the sale of Treasury securities. Treasury provided no details of how the government would decide which of its bills to pay should the borrowing limit not be raised. In a statement, the department said Friday's meeting was to prepare for an upcoming quarterly debt auction.

Negotiators for the Neshaminy School Board and the teachers union will return to the bargaining table in two weeks, board President Richie Webb said Thursday afternoon. Talks in the 3½-year impasse - the longest in the state -- broke off July 18, hours after the board presented its latest offer to the Neshaminy Federation of Teachers. NFT President Louise Boyd called the offer "an insult" and said the union would respond "at an appropriate time. " Both sides and a state mediator agreed on 6 p.m., Thursday, Aug. 11, for the next session, Webb said.

The Neshaminy School Board is scheduled to unveil a new teachers contract offer at 4 p.m. today - the latest step in the contentious 31/2-year negotiations. The board also will release the recommendations of a six-person Citizens Advisory Committee at the afternoon press conference at Neshaminy Maple Point Middle School. Hours later, negotiators for the board and the teachers union will return to the table for the 31st session in the state's longest current impasse. The main sticking points have been pay increases, retroactive pay and contributions to health care costs.