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Current Hot Sheet
October 20, 2005
HOT SHEET #29

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News for AFSCME District Council #36 Locals and their leaders
  February 21, 2006           Number 29

LOCAL 2626 TAKING IT TO THE STREETS

Activists in AFSCME Local 2626, the Librarians Guild are collecting signatures in front of neighborhood libraries in support of  their effort to overcome the last obstacle to settling their contract. The problem is the city-backed side letter which allows the contract to be reopened if the city faces a self determined financial crises and then allows the city to unilaterally impose wage and benefit cuts. In the opinion of the Guild, this is no contract at all. “If the city can change the contract through imposition it is like having a contract written in invisible ink,” said Guild president Roy Stone.

They are finding good support from library patrons, who are willing to sign the petition. After they collect a representative sampling of petitions and they will present them to the City Council and Mayor’s office in the hopes and of settling their contract after two years of negotiation.

SAN DIEGO MAYOR PROPOSES PRIVATIZATION AND PENSION INITIATIVES.

Recently elected Mayor Jerry Sanders of San Diego has proposed two initiatives to be placed on the November, 2006 ballot.  One initiative eases the rules for “managed competition” in the city. The second initiative will make it more difficult to increase retirement benefits for San Diego City employees by require a citywide vote whenever there is a proposed retirement enhancement. They are intended to be an obstacle to future increases. It is ironic that neither proposal addresses the unfunded liability the pension fund faces or was a factor in creating the problem in the first place.

Managed competition is another name for privatization.  According to Local 127 Board member, Kiki Carranza every new Mayor proposes contracting out public services. City employees and have repeatedly shown that they do higher quality work at a better price then their private counterparts. Local 127 members are not concerned about and fair comparisons and between city employees and private sector services, their concern is that the process will become political under the influence of lobbyists and political insiders undermining the integrity of the process. There are plenty of ways to compare ourselves to the private sector or other municipalities without putting our city up for sale.

Several local 127 members and spoke before the city council’s Rules Committee expressing their own concern about these proposals.  The committee forwarded files to the full City Council without taking a position on them.  The full City Council will consider the proposed ballot measures on February 27. Hanging over the Council and is a threat and from the conservative organization’s and view and threatened to circulate and as many as eleven different initiatives that can be considerably more damaging to the city employees.

Getting Ready for Pension Wars II

The battle over defined benefits versus defined contribution continues to rage, as more cities and counties complain about the alleged burden pensions have on their budgets. Opponents to defined benefits claim that public employees have “Cadillac” benefits. The reality  is most employees, even with a pension retire poor.

On February 28 to March 1 the National Conference on Public Employee Retirement Systems will hold a pension summit called “learning Effective Ways to Communicate the DB Message. The meeting will be held at the Holiday Inn in Sacramento.  Contact Hank Kim at 877-202-5706 if you would like to attend.

More Upcoming Events

Secretary Treasurers Training
March 18 9 AM to 5 PM
Council 36 Offices
514 Shatto Place, 3rd floor

Women’s History Month Celebration

March 25 12PM to 4PM

The meeting will focus on Women’s health, safety and financial issues

514 Shatto Place

Negotiations Training
March 31 9 AM to 5 PM

Orange County Office

Place 2101 W. Crescent Av, #C

Anaheim

Stewards Training for Court Locals
Stewards from Locals 575, 3302, 276, 3271, 910 should attend this important training session
Saturday April 8 from 9 AM to 5 PM
District Council offices
514 Shatto Place

U.S. Labor Against the War Demonstration
April 29, 2006
New York City