The University of Connecticut Professional Employees Association came to a contract agreement with the University in late December.  The members voted in favor of the contract 3:1 in mid January and the University's Board of Trustee's approved the contract last week.  While it is good to see a contract move forward, this agreement has limited cross-over for A&R for many reasons.  Foremost, UCPEA negotiates with the University, they do not negotiate with the State in the same manner that we engage the State.  Our negotiations are tied directly to the Governor's/Legislature's personnel costs

The 2016 General Assembly session opens Wednesday Feb 3 and the Governor will present his budget to the legislature.  The "leaked" budget (there are no accidental leaks) calls for layoffs and collective bargaining gains (page 27 of the pdf numbered as page 30...my apologies for the awful copy attached here).

The Governor is going to throw his budget ideas into the lap of the Legislature and it will be up to us to make sure our Legislator's hear us and see us.  We didn’t hire ourselves, we do the jobs they have asked us to do for the betterment of the State.

To start us on the path of re

A&R held its 3rd Contract Negotiations meeting with the State on January 27th.  This meeting was very similar to the other meetings where proposals from both sides were introduced by the respective parties.  This session completed the process for new proposals and the negotiations will commence utilizing the proposals submitted at this point.  The discussions that followed were brief and limited to clarification rather than searching for common ground.  As examples:  A&R questioned why the State proposes a switch to utilizing the State Mediation/Arbitration Board rather than OLR, where does an

All Emotional Distress/Punitive Damage awards of PL and Vacation time should have been applied in the 1/8/16 paystub or the 1/22/16 pay stub.

If you were employed on 11/17/2002 and suffered no ecomonic loss you should have recieved 10hrs PL.

If you bumped down you should have received 32hrs Vacation and 24hrs PL.

If you were laid-off you should have received 80hrs Vacation and 40hrs PL.

If you laterally displaced and your commute was extended by 25+ miles then you are eligible for a ED/Punitive award of 32hrs Vacation and 24hrs PL.  Most likely, you were only awarded 10hrs of PL.  To rectify this

Friedrichs v California Teachers Association -  Oral arguements were made last week in the US Supreme Court on this very impactful case.  The case centers around whether unions can collect a fee from public sector workers who opt out of joining the union.  All employees (even non-members) are covered by the union contract and the union is required by law to represent all employees covered by the contract, not just those who join as union members. This has been an accepted practice for 40 years.   There are some wealthy interest groups who wish to dismantle unionization and have propped up this case aimed at silencing workers' collective voice and the political power of these workers.  While the arguement isn't especially strong, court-watchers feel that the tendencies of the Supreme Court justices are such that the Court's decision is quite possibly going to overturn the fee collection process currently in existence.  Click to read the transcript of the oral arguments.

Rowland Settlement Update:  Emotional Distress and Punitive Damage awards are being applied this month.  Please review the your upcoming paystubs to verify that your award has been processed.  More info...

Step Increases & Top Step Payments:  Employees who recieved a Step Increase or a Top Step Payment on 12/25/15 should see this reflected in their paycheck on 1/21/16.  Top Step Payment chart and current pay scales

2016 A&R Convention and Elections:  The A&R Annual Convention will be held on Thursday April 28th at the A&R Office in Rocky Hill.  Any member interested in running for a seat on the Representative Assembly or running as a delegate to the AFT and/or AFTCT and/or CT AFL-CIO conventions needs to complete a candidacy form.  Candidacy forms and instructions can be found and downloaded under the Resources tab on our website.

The Comptroller's Office has released 2 recent items of interest:
      1) Comptroller Lembo has released his proposal to resolve the State Employee Pension funding policies.  Comptroller Lembo's proposal is in response to the Boston College study of our pension fund and the Governor's subsequent suggestion of splitting Tier 1 from the other Tiers and making Tier 1 "pay as you go". ..just an FYI: the Unions have not been asked to engage in any discussions related to any of the proposals.
     2) The Comptroller's Office released the most recent State budget projection which now appears to be a $200K surplus. 

On 12/23 A&R exchanged collective bargaining proposals with the State.  The Union was shocked to learn that the State Team was 40 Managers plus 1 Assistant Director of  OLR (who has already negotiated two A&R contracts) and the high-priced lawyer that the State contracted as its representative for talks with P-5 (apparently OLR does not believe that it can provide these services adequately...anymore).  

To be fair, it was just before Christmas, so only 28 managers showed up.  

Apparently, when you put 40 managers in a room they are able to become egregiously cynical as their proposals would set