Today's Daily News is reporting that the Law Enforcement Employees Benevolent Association (they guard the watershed upstate) just settled their long ago expired contract with the city. They had not had a contract in nine years so they never received the increases other unions got back in 2005.
They will receive the same 5% and 4% increases that the PBA got in those years according to the News. Their agreement doesn't set a pattern for us but here is an interesting line from the News piece:
Under the new agreement, they will receive an average of more than $50,000 each in back pay.
Is that a precedent for retroactive pay and pattern bargaining remaining in place for us?
I know nothing more than what is in the Daily News piece.
18 comments:
I don't want to sound greedy, but the fact is that according to the "city pattern", the UFT is entitled to retro pay and a raise that matches the last "pattern" in NYC. The city can say that it can't afford to pay, but that is not the problem of PERB or the problem of the UFT. It is NYC's responsibility to find or raise the money needed to fairly pay what is due to it's municipal workers. I can't see how PERB will not agree with the UFT's position. They are to be impartial and are to use the facts based on the last round of bargaining that matches the other unions retro/raises. The fact is that in the last round of bargaining, there was retro and there were raises. The scary thing that I can see is if the DOE/UFT come up with an agreement on their own that is NOT FRAMED on what PERB says. I do not put it past the UFT to sell us out. There should be no givebacks this time around and we should get the retro/raises that we deserve.
I believe Mayor DeB stated in a interview last week that he was NOT giving full retro pay to teachers-correct me if Im wrong.
That is the problem. PERB is most likely going to agree with the UFT that the city does indeed owe the UFT retro and raises. The Mayor is going to cry "we can't afford it". We all know that the arbitration is non-binding, so what might happen is the DOE/UFT will come up with a secret deal on their own where the teachers get screwed once again. I 100% believe that somebody should FOIL the results of the PERB meetings if an agreement is reached that is not based on what was suggested at PERB. That way, when we get screwed with no retro by a secret meeting between the DOE/UFT we can all see that we should have received retro based on PERB's favor. (Mr. Portelos, I hope you are reading this as you are a FOIL expert!)
I can't find his exact quote, but Mayor DeB sounded ominously negative about the teacher retro pay issue-as in very little or none.
Also, Da Police, have special benefactors in Albany. The GOP branch of,government are pro, as,in PRO police. Possible this could have played a role in these 200 officers getting full retro?
Mayor De Blasio has been saying he thinks it is unlikely that teachers will be getting their retro-active pay when he was campaigning.
Now if he gets rid of the the 37 1/2 minutes/ extended day....that may be worth giving up 'part' of retro active pay..
Extended day is the worst....
I wasn't aware there were unions waiting even longer than we were for a contract. It's remarkable what our illustrious former mayor got away with. I'm very curious, if the contract goes back to 05, when it ends. Not having seen the original article, for all we know it still leaves them without a contract, only for fewer years.
Does any of their retro pay concur with years we're due for it? This leaves me with more questions than answers.
Anon I read. I'm ready FOIL. They don't call me "Frankie the FOILer" for nuttin.
How to FOIL: http://protectportelos.org/f-o-i-l/
If you read this blog closely, we have said that a wise course might be to settle the UFT contract for 2009-2010 and 2010-11, the years that PERB is working on where we are owed the 4%+4% raises. That contract would be expired the day it is signed. Then, maybe let the PBA go first for the next round (2011-Present for us probably longer for them. We covered this possibility last week. City I believe would prefer a grand bargain where they settle both of our contracts at once so we set a pattern for the next round that everyone else will be forced to follow. You can be pretty sure that it will not be a very favorable pattern.
If they don't want to give us retro pay them we should or must demand all our rights that we lost in 2005 contract. We should get out of school. Give us back the 37 half minutes. We want Brooklyn Queens day and November election day off! We want the return of seniority transfers (something that every union in the city and state have expect us) We want the right to grieving letters to the file, and on top of that throw in that we want a one for one sick day when we retire, not a 2 for sick day like now. Play hard ball, ask for more than what you want, play poker with them, and don,t back down. You can't afford retro pay that's the city's problem, then give us our rights back!
Darknight
Read in the News that the contract you cite expired in 2007, and that de Blasio says this will not set a precedent for any other union.
Essentially this appears to just catch them up with us.
Precedent is for full arrears. You better believe that is a big deal. City can't make argument that they can pay it for unions two rounds behind but not one. Mulgrew is in public talking about retro. Don't you think he knows how strong our case is for the 4%+4%? Why would he raise expectations?
UFT leaders usually spend their time killing expectations.
What I was saying, James, was that brings them about where we are now--two contracts behind. I wasn't aware Bloomberg had screwed anyone even worse than he did us. I certainly hope you're right. I see no justification in this astral plane for us getting less than other unions, and I distinctly remember PERB labeling pattern sacrosanct when we wished to better it.
Amazing that the only time in my living memory we have an appealing pattern we were denied it.
We will get the 4 percent and the 4 percent. Then we will get another raise.
The elephant that no one wants to discuss:
Local shop stewards aka chapter leaders:
In the pocket of principals
Give up UFT members to OSI
Give up UFT members to SCI
Leave work early,but give up fellow UFT members
What are the thoughts of those who claim to be for social justice, but are in the same caucus as RATS?
Chapter leader and Delegate are positions that are democratically elected by the membership in a school. The Chapter Leader is fully accountable to the members that elect him/her, not to the UFT leadership. It is real democracy. Need more specifics to comment further.
Post a Comment