“We were grateful for all the support that came to Wisconsin from around the world and we wanted to help our brothers and sisters in New York City,” said Tim Birkley, an AFSCME Local 60 member who works for the city of Madison.
Governor’s call comes just after TSEA finds that startling number of TN state employees eligible for food assistance, but that’s not why he ordered it. He actually wants to be able to pay people enough to stay working in state gov’t.
“I don’t know what the administration’s motivations are these days for doing anything that they’re doing,” [VSEA’s Conor Casey] said. “I will say that I disagree with their methodology and their budget instructions. Clearly, what they’re doing is underfunding our contracts by not including the restoration of the 3 percent. I believe that’s part of this contract, not the next contract. They’re starting off on a bad foot with bargaining.”
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"But a report issued this week by the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, led by Sen. Carl Levin (D-Mich.), gives lie to [trickle-down] logic with its stark findings that a notable recent effort to create jobs through corporate tax cuts created a multibillion-dollar corporate windfall that did not trickle down to America’s workers, and did not create new jobs."
"The real money is riding on whether the administration will restore the temporary 3 percent pay cut state employees took two years ago to help close Vermont’s budget gap. That could cost taxpayers an extra $9 million at a time when the shortfall for FY 2013 stands at close to $70 million."
"To be clear: Most of the employees asking for double pay are folks who were called into work when other workers were told to stay home. In fact, more than one third of the workers listed on the grievance are Vermont State Hospital employees. Many of them spent days on the road, living out of hotels, in order to care for residents displaced from the state’s psychiatric hospital."