We have received hundreds of e-mails from state employees, academics and other reporters asking questions about the interplay between the new state budget and the SEIU Local 1000 tentative agreement. Here are answers to some of the most frequently asked questions:
Jon, I was wondering if you could look into how the votes are counted during the SEIU Local 1000 tentative agreement ratification election.
Standard assumptions would indicate the vote count would be reflective of those actual qualified ballots returned. 15,000 ballots received with 9,999 being No votes = TA not ratified.
However, an interesting theory was posed last evening that gave me pause. I am unaware of how many actual SEIU members so let's use 20,000 as an example. It was suggested should 15,000 member ballots be returned and 9,999 ballots are No votes for ratification, the agreement would be ratified since the No votes are counted against the 20,000 total membership.
I tried to find the SEIU Local 1000 by-laws to research this information but was unable to find anything definitive.
We've asked Local 1000 to provide details about its ballot counting rules. Check back for more info as it becomes available.
What about SCIF employees? We're exempt from furloughs. Why should we vote for this contract when it accepts 12 PLP days? Is there a side letter that exempts us?
This is the issue that Local 1000 President Yvonne Walker raised last year when she criticized the legal professionals union, CASE, for successfully litigating furloughs based on where some of its members worked: It splits a union into factions based on where they work. It's bad for unity.
Of course, a few weeks later, Walker and SEIU reversed course and filed a similar lawsuit and won.
We're not aware of any side deals that exclude SEIU-covered employees at State Fund from PLP days.
Have you heard how the Gov plans to re-coup the already passed "self-directed" furlough program months (July through October). This is of course assuming the contract is ratified and I'll be shocked if it isn't. If you have something to post and reference this email please list as anonymous.
The SEIU Local 1000 tentative agreement absorbs the furloughs taken through October. Assuming the TA becomes binding next month, the contract accepts 21 unpaid days off (nine furlough days from August through the end of this month plus 12 PLP days through October 2011). The furlough protections end after the PLP period.
Click here for a summary of the Local 1000 tentative agreement. Look up the TAs by bargaining unit on this page.
For unions without contracts, the furloughs will continue through June 30, 2011, despite terms in Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's July 28 executive order that calls for the furloughs to end when a budget is passed. Unions could negotiate contracts with this administration or the next one that end the furloughs.
Remember, the California Supreme Court ruled after that last executive order that furlough power is vested with the Legislature, not the executive. You'd think that would invalidate Schwarzenegger's last executive order or at least halt furloughs going forward.
But the 2010-11 budget passed by the Legislature includes language that deputizes Schwarzenegger to impose unpaid time off on exempt employees and union-represented workers without contracts. That language is retroactive to the July 1 start of the fiscal year, so the furloughs in August, September and October -- and for next month onward -- were approved by the Legislature using its authority to set wages and working terms.
But what about this , Jon?
Employee Compensation Reductions
The furloughs in 2009/10 were implemented under the Governor's emergency authority
and resulted in one time savings of $1.1 billion General Fund. Funding is restored to
department budgets in 2010/11 consistent with the anticipated end of the furlough
program adopted as part of the 2008 and 2009 revised Budgets.
I found it at this website.
This item has been circulating among state workers as "proof" that the governor is violating his own order by continuing the furloughs.It doesn't prove that. The paragraph is merely a section lifted from Schwarzenegger's budget proposal. Like everything about budget proposals, it's subject to change.
In this case the change is that 3-day furloughs are continuing for about 63,000 state workers without contracts, a policy the Legislature can impose on workers whose unions are without contracts, according to the California Supreme Court. By extending furloughs into next month and beyond, Schwarzenegger is carrying out the will of the Legislature to cut the state's employee compensation costs by a total $1.5 billion for fiscal 2010-11.
What about special fund departments?
The budget bill specifically includes payroll cuts outside the general fund..
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