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* UPDATED x1 * The transformer

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* My Sun-Times column…

Maybe now would be a good time for Gov. Pat Quinn to pay off his bet with Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. After all, according to AFSCME, they’re practically soul brothers these days.

Quinn bet Walker way back in January that the Bears would beat the Packers for the NFC Championship title. The Bears lost, and Quinn was supposed to volunteer at a Wisconsin food bank wearing a Packers jersey.

But Quinn canceled his scheduled Milwaukee appearance after Walker attempted to strip his state’s public employee unions of their collective-bargaining rights and the state exploded with political rage.

Tens of thousands of protesters descended on the Cheesehead Statehouse and the entire Wisconsin Senate Democratic caucus fled to Illinois in an attempt to halt Walker’s agenda. Quinn firmly declared his solidarity with the teeming northern masses, welcomed the fleeing Democrats with open arms and declared Walker an anti-union heathen.

Quinn made some good points during Wisconsin’s troubles. For instance, Quinn was proud of being the first governor in Illinois history to persuade AFSCME to reopen its contract and defer its members’ pay raises. That was no mean feat, even if Quinn did have to agree to no layoffs and no facility closures.

AFSCME, which represents state workers, is about the most obstinate group of hardheads you’ll ever meet. They take their contracts seriously, and they’ve never budged before. Even so, Quinn cut them a decent deal last summer and the union endorsed his re-election soon after.

Quinn has since insisted that his way of doing things was far superior to those heartless right-wingers to our north. They should talk to the unions and work things out, he said. Unions are reasonable if you treat them with respect and dignity.

The problem with kicking the budgetary can down the road is that the bills eventually come due.

AFSCME’s pay raises were deferred to July 1 of this year, and the General Assembly didn’t appropriate enough money to cover all of them.

Rather than slash much-needed programs, the Legislature cut personnel costs. In the end, the budget shorted payrolls for 14 state agencies.

But Quinn had boxed himself in. He couldn’t lay off anybody or close a state facility because he had given AFSCME his word. His staff says he couldn’t move money around within agencies to pay for the raises without harming crucial programs. He couldn’t veto the budget, because then the Republican minority would have a seat at the table, and they would demand even more cuts and wreak loads of havoc.

Ignoring the Legislature’s mandated payroll cuts and handing out the promised raises anyway could result in a minor fiscal crisis next year if he couldn’t persuade the General Assembly to increase the appropriations.

So, the governor decided to reinterpret an old state law that was originally written to protect union contracts in a way that allowed him to break AFSCME’s current state contract.

Without first sitting down and attempting to cut a deal with the union, Quinn unilaterally declared there would be no pay raises for those 14 agencies.

AFSCME was furious with Quinn’s move and the way he handled it. The union’s executive director blustered that Quinn was actually worse than Walker ever was.

Gov. Walker can be excused for experiencing a hugely satisfying rush of schadenfreude right about now.

If you can’t honor your union contracts, Gov. Quinn, you can at least honor your bet.

Go get yourself a Packers jersey, swallow hard, and take off for the Great White North.

*** UPDATE *** I should’ve added Finke’s story to this post…

A legislative committee could vote next week to block Gov. Pat Quinn’s plan to rescind pay raises for 30,000 state government workers. […]

However, Rep. Angelo “Skip” Saviano, R-Elmwood Park, a co-chairman of the committee, said there is little time for the committee members to review the 376-page emergency rule.

“I don’t know if we are going to be ready or willing to take it up,” Saviano said Thursday. “I would think something as complicated as this would need more time.”

The committee’s next scheduled meeting is in August. An emergency rule can stay in effect for up to 150 days.

* Also, Don Moss has penned an open letter to JCAR…

Dear Members of the Joint Committee on Administrative Rules -

We advocates for people with disabilities do not begrudge pay raises for the thousands of hardworking state employees. However, we do wish to point out the inequities between what they receive and what their private non profit community services “partners” have received over the past several years. Please see the two charts below and keep them in mind when 1) You consider the Governor’s freeze on state raises, and 2) the next time you vote on the funding of community service providers.

And here are the charts. Click the pic for a larger view…

Thoughts?

posted by Rich Miller
Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 9:55 am

Comments

So basically Quinn is a Decepticon.

Comment by Anonymous Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 10:07 am
How did the Unions meet the savings that they were supposed to come up with(I forgot how many millions) when Quinn gave the no lay-off agreement?

Comment by Jim Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 10:10 am
–”AFSCME’s pay raises were deferred to July 1 of this year”–

This is slightly off. The deferred was due and forthcoming June 1st, 2011. Then there was to be a 4% on July 1st of 2011 which was voted by members to once again defer part of the July 1st 2011 raise…we voted ‘yes’ and were set to get just 2% on July 1st with the remaining defer 2% due Feb 2012. Quinn selectedly decided nope to some of us for the 2% on July 1st and to forget about any deal made for Feb 1st.

Yeah, I’m pretty annoyed by Quinn right now…might even like to see a picture of him cleaning the kitchen up after honoring his Wisconsin deal. But it really has little to do with what many here may think. I seriously resent bargaining in ‘good faith’ only to have one side go ‘oops’. It just really won’t sit well when bargaining begins in ‘good faith ‘ this January for the next cycle.

I also resent going out and speaking to fellow members with a ‘vote’ sheet and asking then to vote for the deferrals. Kinda makes me feel like a judas wagon to currently shocked members which I must work with now. I don’t like looking like a person who tried to mislead them. Some of them have not forgotten how they were told the furlough days would not affect pensions the first time around they were asked to take those.

With all that said, don’t think I’ll be so annoyed that I race out and vote Republican ticket next election. It won’t happen. I’m far more than just annoyed by that party than I am Quinn.

Comment by Cindy Lou Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 10:19 am
Good article, nicely summarizes Quinn’s quandry in the major leagues.

Comment by Anonymous Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 10:20 am
If AFSCME wants Quinn to retract from his new found positions, they should start with mass protests outside the James Thompson State of Illinois Building and the Capitol Building in Springfield.

The glare of the press seems to motivate Quinn more than governing at times.

Comment by Louis G. Atsaves Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 10:23 am
>>

So don’t complain about Quinn’s actions. Rationalizing that “the other guys are worse” won’t solve your problem as a public sector union worker in Illinois. Being betrayed by your friends is far worse sometimes. Ask the practicing claimants attorneys in the field of Workers’ Compensation how they feel these days about the feeling of being betrayed. They have been grousing up a storm since Memorial Day. And that is but one example.

I repeat what I said yesterday, AFSCME and other state unions should start spreading their cash and volunteers around to include some Republicans who could be sympathetic to their causes. Right now the GOP considers those unions to be the enemy because they heavily support only Democrats.

What I have found interesting is how the Democratic Party of Illinois has slapped down its base of voters on a variety of topics. They hammered them with higher personal income taxes. They pounded them on Workers’ Compensation benefits. They are now hammering union contracts and agreements and trying to decertify certain job categories. They redistricted Springfield and Congressional seats without adding additional Hispanic representation and shorting the suburbs.

Need I go on? Yet they know their base will stick with them anyway. Pretty interesting behavior.

Comment by Louis G. Atsaves Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 10:34 am
Also much like transformers this budget approach seems to be a lot of special effects and very little plot.

Comment by OneMan Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 10:53 am
Great chart from Don Moss, but giving lawmakers the choice between:

1) Rolling back state employee wages to achieve parity with non-profit providers, and

2) Giving non-profit providers a rate increase to achieve parity with state employees

I think there’s little doubt lawmakers will go with #2.

A better argument:

We have a moral and in some cases legal obligation to provide critical services to people with developmental disabilities.

The same cannot be said of tax subsidies for Groupon, Sears, Motorola, etc.

Comment by Yellow Dog Democrat Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 11:06 am
I still believe the decision to withhold pay raises and break the contract was more about putting pressure on the GA than it was about Quinn breaking his promise to union. If the GA provides the additional appropriation to fund the salary increases (with money we don’t have by the way) then it becomes a canny political move on Quinn’s part. If the GA fails to increase appropriations then Quinn can continue to blame the GA for the debacle.

Comment by Kerfuffle Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 11:08 am
===If the GA fails to increase appropriations then Quinn can continue to blame the GA for the debacle. ===

Doubtful. The governor was completely disengaged from the budget process. He can’t make someone else wear the jacket alone.

Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 11:11 am
Rich - That doesn’t mean that he still can’t blame them - disengaged or not.

Comment by Kerfuffle Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 11:14 am
He can blame them, just not successfully, which goes right to the heart of your original point. It ain’t a win-win.

Comment by Rich Miller Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 11:15 am
I think what the govenor did was very wrong. this from a guy (not in the union) hasnt seen a raise in 8 years. In fact my pay has gone down with all the furloughs i have to take. Let the union try that one on!

Comment by Just Because Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 11:23 am
I was looking at the second table (the table titled ‘funding inequities II’) shown above. From Jan. 2009 to May 2011 state employee wage increases, excluding merit increases, are listed in the table as being 9%. This excludes the July 2011 and any other future pay increases.

Looking at the inflation numbers for the Chicago metro area for the same period thru May 2011 (most recent month for which inflation data is available) the BLS CPI data (whichs includes a decrease in prices for some months during the period) appears to show inflation only about 2/3 the amount of the wage increases for the period.

Is there any ‘inequitie’ here for the tax payers of Illinois?

Comment by Left Out Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 12:23 pm
Done in 1!

Comment by Wumpus Friday, Jul 8, 11 @ 12:55 pm