By Bill Cameron, WLS News

The Chicago Teachers Union has voted 96% in favor of authorizing a strike if necessary.

What the strike authorization vote means is that a teachers strike could be called as early as late March or early April but as late as the beginning of the next school year in September. Legal fact-finding has to occur first.

But why would a strike help the teachers cause? CTU Vice President Jesse Sharkey says it would put pressure on for more money for schools.

“We’re not going to take it lying down – that there are just these big cuts,” said Sharkey.  “We’re not going to take it as a fait accompli that the only way they can do this is cutting.  Our members will not go to work if we have to – you know, be in the streets in the city of Chicago to demand justice for our schools.”

Rather than a strike, Mayor Emanuel says the teachers union should join him in lobbying Springfield to give Chicago more money, but Sharkey says the current Springfield plan is a road to nowhere.

@ 2015 WLS News