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93 percent of AFSCME members vote to ratify state contract

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Illinois

* State workers have ratified their new contract…

Members of the state’s largest employee union have approved a contract giving them a 15.2 percent wage hike over the four-year life of the pact. | Prisons scramble to make digital TV switch | Archived Video: Prison closure hearing

Although details of the vote were not available Friday morning, Linc Cohen, spokesman for the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31 said the vote was “overwhelmingly” in favor of ratification.

“We don’t have a final tally yet though,” Cohen said.

The agreement calls for the 35,000 AFSCME members to pay slightly higher health-insurance premiums, but the increased costs are lower than what was initially being pushed by state negotiators.

* A press release just issued by AFSCME claims that 93 percent of its members ratified the contract…

Ratification meetings were held at more than 100 worksites throughout the state, where the terms of the new agreement were explained and union members had the opportunity to have their questions answered by those who served on the AFSCME negotiating team. In the voting, which took place at each worksite meeting, 93 percent of union members voted in favor of ratifying the new agreement. The Union has notified the State of the ratification and the new contract is now in effect.

“The resounding affirmative vote for this contract is an indication that union members believe it is a fair settlement that will help provide economic security at a time when the cost of living is steadily rising,” said AFSCME Council 31 Executive Director Henry Bayer.

The agreement preserves the current pension and health benefits for retired state employees.

* The SJ-R has a copy of the contract in “tentative form” that can be accessed here.

posted by Rich Miller
Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 2:18 pm

Comments

I wonder where the money is going to come from to pay for the raises.

Personel line items, retirment contributions etc were all cut by the Gov, but the new contract mandates increase payments from these line items for the various agnecies and officers of AFSME employees without an increase in the budget.

Comment by Ghost Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 2:53 pm
AFSCME has misrepresented contract details AGAIN! The contract allows CMS to re-open the contract in two years to re-negotiate health care costs. AFSCME has always fought and fought hard to keep the re-open/re-negotiation verbage from the contract and rightly so. This is a slippery slope which creates a precedent. The state will now use this precedent to re-open contracts in the future. In essence, the union negotiated a 2 year health contract with a 4 year wage package. Unfortunately, all the members saw were the raises and paid no attention to what AFSCME was allowing the state to do to them and the retirees down the road. Granted the union has a codicile allowing them to “REQUEST” to re-open wages if management re-opens for health care costs, but anyone who thinks that more raises will be coming to offset any increase in health care costs has, as mother says “Another think coming.” AFSCME has dangled some purty sparkley beads in front of its members and some of them apparently fell for it hook line and sinker. Personally I voted against the contract because of the re-opening thing and the fact that the union did NOT stay at the table and finish the negotiations. According to the fellow that came to explain the contract in my building, they gave in on the health care issue, co’s if they didn’t they would stll be at the table - which is OK in my book. Another issue is that we will be going without a raise until January. The first raise should have been retro-active to July 2008. AFSCME sold out again.

Comment by Sweet Polly Purebred Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 3:03 pm
BTW - it protects retirees health for only the first two years of the contract - just like current state employees, but AFTER 2 years, all bets are OFF.

Comment by Sweet Polly Purebred Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 3:08 pm
two years — more governing to get us past the next election cycle; in this case, the 2010 gubernatorial election.

Did AFSMCE have to promise to endorse the current incumbent just to get this much in their agreement?

Does the belated 4% jump assume a tax increase will have happened by then, or are the few remaining state employees to be paid in script?

Comment by Capitol View Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 3:34 pm
Retirees health would be protected by ERISA. its pretty much to late to take a benefit away from those who have alrady obtained it.

Current employees are a whole different barrel of barley.

Comment by Ghost Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 3:43 pm
Union leaders mst be pumping a heck of a lot of their member’s dues to the reelect Rod committee to receive a raise like this in these times because rank and file don’t have one good thing to say about him

Comment by Leave a light on George Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 3:47 pm
Ghost - Now I am really confused. I checked the feds website regarding ERISA sometime ago and this is what I found :
“In general, ERISA does not cover group health plans established or maintained by governmental entities, churches for their employees, or plans which are maintained solely to comply with applicable workers compensation, unemployment, or disability laws. ERISA also does not cover plans maintained outside the United States primarily for the benefit of nonresident aliens or unfunded excess benefit plans.” Please help me here. What am I missing? I really need to know, because if ERISA will guarantee my health care at its current rate, I will most definitely retire before the re-opening/re-negotiating begins in two years.

Comment by Sweet Polly Purebred Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 3:49 pm
I bet the 7% are the ones that AFSCME knew were getting the ax two days after the contract deal was cut.

Comment by Glam-Or-Party Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 4:01 pm
Hey Sweet Polly: The Private Sector, Look Into It.

Comment by Give Me A Break Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 4:29 pm
==Retirees health would be protected by ERISA. its pretty much to late to take a benefit away from those who have alrady obtained it.==

Ghost-public employees’ or retirees’ benefits are not covered by ERISA in any way, shape or form. Illinois public pensions have constitutional protection; healthcare does not. Exhibit A: Retired Teachers’ health benefits were “revised downward” effective 7/1/08 in several areas as their premiums increased.

Comment by Arthur Andersen Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 4:59 pm
Hmm, I wonder if private sector employees with similar skills and education can look forward to these kinds of extravagant wage hikes. Probably not. But if they live here, they’ll be paying for state employee raises.

Anyway, if over 90% of the members voted in favor, we taxpayers know we took a bath here. Blago and the Dems—working for you, Illinois.

Comment by Cassandra Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 5:37 pm
The wage hikes certainly aren’t extravagant, Cassandra.

Let’s face it, private or public sector, wages are secondary to health coverage. If you have it, you’ll eat a lot of stuff to keep it. If you don’t have it, you’re on thin ice if you’re trying to protect a home an family.

Comment by wordslinger Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 5:48 pm
Cassie,
C’Mon. 3.8% averages raises can hardly be called “extravagant wage hikes”. The cost of living will increase quite a bit more than that this year and probably more next year until President’s Obama’s economic plan kicks in and they will have to pay more for their health insurance.Most state workers salaries are lower than their counterparts in the private sector. Considering the re-opener clause, this is not that good of a contract. The 93% number is probably a result of fear more than anything else. This is a real good deal for the state at the expense of the rank and file employees. I suppose that they believed their leaders that this was the best that they could do. Maybe it was.

Comment by Bill Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 5:54 pm
This contract failed at my place of work. A lot of us are not happy with some of the provisions. The raises are ok but they do not keep up with cost of living.

Comment by Ultra50k Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 8:28 pm
We spent months and countless hours to bring back a good contract to our members. The majority agree and that’s ALL that counts. nuf said

Comment by Was there Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 8:36 pm
Cassie, are you really Larry Msall? Your shrill one-note cheap shots at public servants are eerily similar to, and almost as repetitive as Larry’s.

If you would “Try the Google” before firing off a flamer, you would find a handful of surveys that show on the average recent private sector pay increases in Illinois are running just over 3%. The AFSCME contract is not extravagant by any fair measure. As word correctly notes, more and more of the give and take at the table in the future is going to be about healthcare, not wages.

AA speculates that the massive, overreaching givebacks tossed out by the Blago Keystone Kops negotiating team at the start of bargaining probably helped AFSCME a bit along the way.

Bill has another good point in that the reopener does give Blago & Co. a mischief opportunity before the ink is barely dry.

The next move will be to cut more jobs or dump on the Merit Comp folks “because we can’t afford the contract.”

Comment by Arthur Andersen Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 10:01 pm
I have worked in the non-profit sector, contracting with the state for 30 years, while my husband worked for the state about the same. I have always been on his health insurance because it was always so much better and less expensive. When he retired several years ago, I couldn’t believe we got to keep those benefits! You get a guarantee of 4% a year COLA, and pretty good health insurance. Try to get that anywhere else!

Comment by Wife of State Retiree Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 10:01 pm
I estimated the 1.5% raise effec 01/01 is really 1.3% after the health care increases. We sold Dad’s house last year to pay for his health care expenses which are considerable. After all of his money is exhausted, he’ll be eligible for Medicaid. That’s where we’re all headed.

Comment by Emily Booth Friday, Sep 5, 08 @ 10:21 pm