By The PA. AFL-CIO

– President Bloomingdale and Secretary-Treasurer Snyder hosted a very interesting and educational forum on Pensions which was live – streamed by Pennsylvania Cable Network, and is being broadcast statewide on PCN’s cable stations. Check PCN’s daily schedule on their web site for repeat broadcasts.

The Forum was held at the AFSCME Conference Center in Harrisburg on the evening of the Harrisburg Region Central Labor Council which gave the delegates the opportunity to attend the Forum at the conclusion of their meeting. President Bloomingdale and Secretary-Treasurer Snyder express their gratitude to CLC President Dave Gash in his efforts and cooperation in making the forum a success.

Members of the panel did an outstanding job in dispelling the myths and the misinformation about the so-called pension crisis. Joyce Culpepper, an AFSCME retiree who worked for the Commonwealth for 40 years, provided a convincing account of the importance of having a good pension. Without a good defined benefits pension she would have kept working, because retirement would not be affordable for her and thousands upon thousands of other state and school employees, she said.

President Bloomingdale noted that 401 (k) – type pensions that are now predominating the landscape, were never meant to replace employer provided defined benefit pensions. It’s is the primary reason why older workers cannot afford to retire and are still working at McDonalds and Burger King, he observed.

Secretary-Treasurer Snyder added that closing off the defined benefit pensions to younger workers is nothing more than a scheme of Wall Street to siphon off the retirement savings of workers. It will end up destroying good pensions and costing the taxpayers of Pennsylvania even more – an additional $42 billion over 30 years.

Steve Nickol, a retirement consultant for PSEA, estimated the retirement earnings for a worker, who, just like Ms. Culpepper, had worked for 40 years for the Commonwealth, to be a little more than $10,000 per year under the 401 (k) plan proposed in Senate Bill 1. That is more than two-thirds less than the $33,000 per year Ms. Culpepper receives.

Where did the money go, Aronson asked the audience, neither to the taxpayers nor to the workers? It went in the pockets of Wall Street risk takers gambling away your retirement savings. Aronson believes the proposal to make current employees pay more or have their pension benefits reduced is unconstitutional.

The real crisis is too many workers do not have good pensions and cannot afford to retire. Our elected officials shouldn’t be sidestepping their responsibility and making the problem much worse than it is. They should be finding ways to make it easier for workers to have good pensions, retirement security, good jobs, and decent wages, Bloomingdale said.

By Alison Burdo

– Philadelphia City Council will not consider the school district’s request for $103 million in city funding, instead setting a goal of about $80 million after weeks of closed-door discussions, KYW Newsradio reported.

…the consensus among councilmembers is to provide in the range of $70-80 million — just under the school district’s projected deficit of $85 million.

But how to achieve that? Councilmembers remain resistant to a major property tax hike as Mayor Nutter proposes, but there seems to be no consensus on alternate means.

According to multiple sources, a host of ideas are being looked at, including increasing the city’s Use and Occupancy (U&O) tax, raising the tax on off-street parking, passing a smaller property tax hike, and/or the sale of tax liens to third parties.

The budget conversations are set to continue, with hopes a decision would be passed on June 18 — the last scheduled weekly meeting of City Council before they begin a three-month summer recess,

Source – http://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/morning_roundup/2015/06/phila-city-council-school-district-funding-80-mil.html

By Laura Clawson

– Here’s something new: a court upholding a policy that business lobby groups say is unfairly pro-worker. The first of two legal challenges to the National Labor Relations Board’s rule modernizing and streamlining union representation elections failed in court on Monday. The lawsuit, brought by the National Federation of Independent Business and Texas chapters of the Associated Builders and Contractors (sometimes called the ALEC of the construction industry), was rejected by Judge Robert Pitman of the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas.

“[The] plaintiffs point to nothing in the record which supports their conclusion that the board intended to favor organized labor,” he wrote.

Another lawsuit, from business groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, is still happening, and they may find the judge they want this time.

The rule the business groups are so upset about would cut waiting times for union representation elections, put off litigation—often filed by businesses to drag out the election process—until after the election, allow election petitions to be filed electronically, require businesses to share additional worker contact information with union organizers, and consolidate the post-election appeals process. Opponents of the rule have said it permits “ambush elections,” and it’s true that bosses would have less time to intimidate and fire workers for supporting the union. But “we want more time to break the law and file frivolous lawsuits” is not the most appealing reason to oppose a policy, you know?

Congressional Republicans previously tried to block the policy, but President Obama vetoed that attempt.

Source – http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/06/02/1389894/-Judge-upholds-labor-board-rule-bringing-union-representation-elections-into-the-21st-century

By The Philly Public Record

– Organized labor made a difference in the community at the 16th Annual Charity Golf Classic. Honoree Patrick B. Gillespie, Business Manager of the Philadelphia Building and Construction Trades Council, AFL-CIO and founder Samuel Staten, Sr., Retired Business Manager of the Laborers’ District Council of the Metropolitan Area of Philadelphia and Vicinity, came together at Spring Mill Country Club in Ivyland, Pa. last week.

The festivities included a full day of Golf, lunch, cocktails, dinner, awards and auction.

Source – http://www.phillyrecord.com/2015/05/samuel-staten-sr-charitable-trust-golf-classic/

By Bill Hangley

– Teachers in the region’s Catholic high schools have rejected an “early bird” contract offer from the Archdiocese of Philadelphia, setting the stage for a possible strike during the pope’s highly anticipated visit to the region this fall.

Rita Schwartz, the president of the Association of Catholic Teachers, said her members don’t want to strike. But if they do, she hopes Pope Francis will understand.

“He just spoke not too long ago with the Italian Catholic teachers union, and he told them how much he respected them, and how underpaid they were,” Schwartz said “So I wrote to him and I asked to meet with him while he’s here in Philadelphia in September.”

Schwartz said she hoped any strike would be over by then. “I hope I’m not meeting him outside — I’d rather meet him inside,” she said.

And while she insisted that she wasn’t trying to use the pope’s visit for the World Meeting of Families as leverage to get a better deal, she did say she was encouraged by the pontiff’s expression of support for organized labor and teachers alike, calling the Italian teachers’ low salaries “an injustice.”

Details of the latest proposal aren’t available. But Schwartz said that the “early bird” offer from the archdiocese — in which the parties agree to limit negotiations to only salaries and benefits — would have represented a net loss for her members.

“If they’re going ask us to pay more for medical, we understand that,” said Schwartz. “But we also need a salary increase to pay for that. We can’t go back to school at a loss. We can’t.”

Archdiocese officials didn’t want to comment, but did release a statement saying they remain “committed to a contract agreement that respects the needs of not only our teachers but also our school families who sacrifice to provide a quality Catholic education for their children.”

The archdiocese says it will continue to bargain in good faith in hopes of finding a deal that is “fair to all parties while recognizing that the needs and expectations of our students and school families are paramount.”

Negotiations between the union and the archdiocese will continue through the summer. The Catholic school teachers last struck for two weeks in 2011, winning a pay raise of about 8 percent.

A total of about 13,000 students attend the archdiocese’s 17 high schools in the five-county region.

Source – http://www.newsworks.org/index.php/local/item/82490-as-teachers-reject-offer-from-philly-archdiocese-union-leader-seeks-papal-intervention