Shasta Courts Unit Members meeting:
Date: Monday, May 11, 2009
Where: UPEC Local 792 office, 1860 Park Marina Dr
Time: 5:00 pm
Subject: To discuss furlough issues potentially affecting Court employees.
REDDING HQ - Local 792 held nominations for the UPEC Executive Board of Directors on Saturday, May 2nd for the 2009-2012 term. The term begins on July 1, 2009. The membership previously approved to expand the Executive Board representation to include new areas gained during the current term. The new board was decided quickly as there was only one person nominated to each position and there is no need for a formal election for this term. Business Manager & Secretary-Treasurer Chris Darker retained his seat for a third consecutive term. Current Board members continuing are; Mike Cottone, Trinity Region, Keith Coker, Lassen Region, Mike Karges, Siskiyou Region, Mary Lou Allen, Modoc Region, Steve Suske, Tom Pringle and Ralph Winstead, Shasta Region, Larry Olsen, Glenn-Colusa Region, and Holly Pearson, Butte Region, Newly elected is Paul Honn, San Francisco Region and for the Santa Clara-Santa Cruz Region, Paul Mullet. The Monterey Region seat will remain vacant until the board makes an appointment to that seat. The private hospital board seat is left vacant until UPEC has a contract with Shasta Regional Medical Center (SRMC). Debbie Belstad is the current Board member. Current Board At-Large members Ron Huey and Diane White both of the Shasta County Region will step down June 30th.
UCS News Service- The long and deep recession is taking a toll on workers in nearly every sector of the economy, and government employees are no exception. According to a survey by the New York Times, at least 15 states in every part of the country are in various stages of considering or carrying out furloughs. “This may very well be the most widespread us (of furloughs), or consideration of use, at least since the emergence of the post-World War II economic boom,” Robert Bruno, professor of labor relations at the University of Illinois, Chicago, told the Times. But furloughs can be a problem for states in a way they may not be for a private company where demand for a product has dropped, the newspaper noted. Government services remain in even greater demand in a weak economy. Furloughs often mean fewer workers handling a larger load. For instance, there are already signs of disability claims piling up in seven states. “The word ‘furlough’ sounds nice and fluffy, like, “This isn’t painful, we aren’t doing layoffs.’ “said Hetty Rosenstein, director of the largest state-worker union in New Jersey. There, an appeals court has upheld a plan to make state workers take two furlough days by June 30, the end of the fiscal year, and 12 more in the next fiscal year. “But,” she added, “furloughs are fundamentally a cut in pay. And furloughs are a cut in service. If you don’t have people working, the work isn’t going to to magically get done.” The newspaper found that the longest state furloughs so far appear to be 24 days in Alabama, the same number that ha been proposed in Minnesota. Furloughs of public employees can affect critical services like police and fire protection, prison guard duty and hospital care. Unions in Minnesota say that proposed furloughs there would have cost more than they would have saved, do in part to lost services. The impact of furloughs on the delivery of public services is beginning to show One stark example is at the Social Security Administration, a program paid for the federal government by administered by state workers, In seven states, 2,700 of those workers had been furloughed, further delaying the processing of tens of thousands of disability claims, which already take an average of 488 days to resolve. Services in several California counties were already curbed because of layoffs before the state instituted furloughs for the first time in its history in February, when it ordered 90 percent of its 238,000 employees to take off two days of unpaid leave per-month. In New Jersey, the state worker unions are angry that they did not have the chance to negotiate the stat’;s cost-savings package, which was imposed unilaterally, as it was in California. In New York, Gov. David A. Paterson has said that if the state employee unions do not agree to concessions he will lay off about 9,000 of the state’s 200,000 employees.
UCS News Service- Members of the Communications Workers of America employed by AT&T Mobility have approved a new contract for 20,000 workers. The agreement increases wages 8.5 percent over four years and includes a $500 lump-sum ratification payment, according to the union. It also adds flexibility for the employer, the union said. The AT&T Mobility “Orange” contract covers wokers in the company’s wireless buiness, a fast growing part of AT&T that had been formerly named Cingular WIreless. CWA Executive Vice Presiden Annie Hill said the contract broke new ground in the areas of compensation for retail store workers and expanding career opportunity amung customer service personnel. “For customer service workers, this first-ever career path shows that skill and experience will begin to be recognized and rewarded by AT&T Mobility, “ Hill said. Amoung other language, the contract says that wen shifting positions from full time to part time, the company will ask first for volunteers before imposing the change in reverse seniority order. Laid-off workers will be given priority placement for rehire. Maximun severance payments rise by $3,000 to $15,000. The contract was approved by 73 percent of the members who voted, the union said.