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The latest in the cue-card extravaganza: Here’s a letter that the former City Council member-turned-charter school operator Eva Moskowitz just sent to teachers union president Randi Weingarten, her rival.

The letter is a response to Weingarten’s appearance on Fox 5′s Good Day New York this morning. Weingarten told Fox 5 that City Council members commonly ask the teachers union for advice on issues. She said that Moskowitz herself asked for information when she chaired the council’s education committee.

“I find that people shouldn’t be hypocrites,” Weingarten said. “Eva used to ask us all the time when she was education chair for questions to prep the City Council about, you know, what’s really going on in schools.”

Moskowitz writes back today in a letter to Weingarten saying that the characterization is false — and demanding a retraction:

I never asked the UFT or any party to propose questions for me.  I held over a hundred days of hearings as Chairperson of the Education Committee.  I demand that you identify a single instance in which I asked the UFT for questions or used questions prepared for me by the UFT.  You will be unable to find such an example because it does not exist.  In light of that, please retract your inaccurate and defamatory statement.

A rivalry between Weingarten and Moskowitz burst open in 2005 when Weingarten campaigned heavily against Moskowitz’s bid for borough president of Manhattan. Moskowitz had targeted labor unions in hearings when she chaired the education committee.

This week, Moskowitz testified at the same hearing that drew the controversy that a “union-political complex” is holding the city back.

Here’s the full letter: (more…)

Union president Randi Weingarten said that she is going to “make some changes in the union” to correct the cue-card lobbying that happened at Monday’s City Council hearing, which she called inappropriate. Weingarten made the comments on Fox 5′s Good Day New York. (Here’s where you can view our slideshow of exactly what the cards the union sent to council members said.)

Yet despite her mea culpa, Weingarten defended the union’s right to help elected officials prepare for hearings:

You do your job as advocates — and we are fierce advocates — when you do everything you can to make sure that people are prepared. That’s your job. But you don’t do something that creates the appearance of impropriety.

I wrote to some union officials asking what exactly will change in the union’s lobbying practice, which they have argued is not the way they usually do business. I haven’t heard back.

The Daily News’ Liz Benjamin reported on the video earlier today. She also, generously, and, unfortunately, against convention, acknowledged that we reported this story first. Thanks, Liz!