President Bellini Announces Highest VSEA Membership Ever!

“This is a pretty special achievement, and I want to thank everybody who has had a hand in helping make this happen, from VSEA frontline employees to union leaders and activists to staff,” Bellini tells WIA. “We have a lot of very serious challenges ahead of us as a union, so we’ll be needing every one of our 5,920 members—and every VSEA retiree—to help us win the tough fights.”

Petitions For Board of Trustees’ Elections Due Thursday,

June 1!

There are four VSEA Board of Trustees’ seats up for election in 2017, and they are:

• Supervisory Unit Trustee
• Corrections Unit Trustee
• Defender General/Housing Authority Trustee
• District 4 Trustee (Burlington)

VSEA members interested in running for one of the seats above are required to submit a petition bearing no fewer than 25 VSEA members’ names, signatures and employee number.

Download Petitions Here!

Storm Clouds On The Horizon For State Programs That Rely On Federal Funding?

The U.S. Congress got to the business this week of formally vetting the new Administration’s budget proposals to determine each one’s breadth, impact and service and human toll. Initial reports are not encouraging for some Vermont public services, but it’s still early in the process so it’s still unclear which of the Administration’s budget proposals will be adopted (if any) and which will be tossed. In advance of anything being finalized at the federal level, the online publication Governing.com this week published a story that ranks states based on each one’s current reliance on federal funding.

Here are some the Vermont rankings on note:

Public Welfare = 73.5% (12th in the nation)
Education = 9.9% (46th in the nation)
Roads = 58% (5th in the nation)

Overall, federal revenue accounts for 35% of Vermont’s General Fund budget.

Some Of What We Know About The Administration’s Federal Budget Proposal:

• Cuts Labor Department (DOL) budget by 20 percent;

• Cuts National Labor Relations Board budget by 6 percent;

• Increases Department of Homeland Security budget by 7 percent;

• Slashes DOL worker training programs by 36 percent;

• Proposes $1.6 billion outlay to build wall on U.S. southern border;

• Adds 500 new Border Agents and 1,000 Deportation Officers;

• Increases staff at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services;

• Increases staff in federal Immigration Courts by 12 percent;

• Cuts 10 percent of the staff of the Human Services Office of the Inspector General;

• Cuts $190 billion in funding from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in next ten years;

• Calls for reduction in funding for the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Program;

• Cuts the USAID budget by 30 percent;

• Cuts $2 billion, two years straight, from disability programs;

• Cuts $5.8 billion over next 10 years from Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP);

• Eliminates subsidized student loans in 2018;

• Cuts Education Department’s budget by 13.5 percent in 2018; and

• Cuts one-third of the Environmental Protection Agency’s overall budget.

Note: The Vermont Legislature is already preparing to reconvene in October 2017, which is when the Congress must pass its budget. Lawmakers have intimated that they have several revenue generation ideas in their pocket to mitigate at least some of the damage from federal cuts.

Editorial Blasts State For Budget Veto Threat

The May 20 Times Argus published an editorial tilted “Standing Firm,” and it is highly critical of the State’s threat to veto a budget that was approved a near majority of lawmakers—a feat unheard of in the past decade. The editorial compares the State’s actions and veto threat to tactics employed by Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker in his well-documented campaign to decimate that state’s labor unions.

The editorial ends, "There need not be a budget veto. Vermont is not Wisconsin, and to promote the divisive politics besetting that state would not be a service to workers or taxpayers, who after all, are the same people."

Read Editorial

Next Franklin/ Grand Isle Chapter Meeting Is Friday, June 2

Building Community Solidarity! Bennington Chapter Hosts Craft Booth At Youth Appreciation Day Event

“We had 112 youth participate in making face masks and designing puzzles with Bennington Chapter members,” says Thorpe.

VSEA Recognized For “Employer Support Of The Guard & Reserve”

VSEA Operations Director Ray Stout accepted a special award this week on behalf of your union. VSEA is being acknowledged by the federal Department of Defense for its support for Vermont Guard personnel and Reservists. The award is in recognition of VSEA headquarters employing both Air National Guard member Laurie Hassett and Navy Reservist Amy Haskins.

An awards banquet was conducted at the Capital Plaza Hotel on May 23, where Stout accepted an official certificate. He is pictured here at the ceremony, flanked by Haskins (left) and Hassett (right).

VSEA thanks all its veterans and all its members who are currently serving our country. VSEA is proud to support our Armed Forces.

New Study Finds Vermont Does Not Have An Exorbitant Number Of Public Employees

Often during election season, you will hear some politician openly grousing about Vermont having more public workers than any other New England state, but a new scorecard reveals what other studies before it have as well—we don’t.

Labor blogger Mike Antonucci recently compiled a score sheet to determine "public sector workers as a percentage of state’s total workforce" numbers for all states.

Across New England the percentages were:

• Vermont = 14.8%
• Connecticut = 14.8%
• Maine = 15.9%
• Massachusetts = 12.6%
• New York = 16.8%
• New Hampshire = 14.4%

Kentucky Judiciary Stands Up For State’s Social Workers

The Kentucky Associated Press reports on May 24 that some Kentucky judges and attorneys have begun to publicly sound the alarm about the impact a lack of frontline social workers is having on the state’s ability to adequately protect its children.

"Social workers that have 40 families on their caseloads, that is a time bomb looking for a place to go off," Bullitt County Family Court Judge Elise Spainhour explained to a panel of state representatives during the first of several meetings to come up with legislation to overhaul a dysfunctional system. "It’s an inhuman standard that we have set on social workers."

Editorial Warns Texas Lawmakers Against Putting New Public Employee Hires In 401K Retirement Plan

In response to some Texas lawmakers desire to pass a bill that would place new public employee hires (including police officers and firefighters) in a 401K defined contribution retirement plan—as opposed to the existing defined benefit plan that currently covers all Texas public employees—Texas Association of Public Employee Retirement Systems’ Executive Director Max Patterson penned an op-ed in the Houston Chronicle on May 23, titled “401K Push Is Big Risk For Public-Sector Employees.”

It reads, in part:

“It is unconscionable that 401(k)s, having wreaked havoc upon retirement security for private sector employees, are now conservatives’ best policy option. Let’s look at their problems.

First, 401(k)s are expensive. Compliance and management fees have been documented to sap returns to a degree far greater than most people admit. Then, doing-it-yourself is not for everyone: It’s hard to be the best investment manager for your own portfolio while working your full-time job. And most individual investors are unwisely risk averse, investing in bonds or near-cash equivalents when they should be in stocks in early adulthood. The problem is the loss of growth opportunities: Stocks show better returns over the long-term.

Other facts prove these 401(k) problems troubling. Retiring comfortably requires about $375,000 for the average American. The average account balance in Fidelity Investments managed plans was only $88,900 in June 2016 and thus may only generate about $4,500 per year in interest without touching principal. Considering there are more than 70 million people participating in 401(k) plans, the average balance is abysmally low. It is no surprise that a recent Insured Retirement Institute survey of 800 Americans aged 54-70 found just 23 percent thought their savings would last.”

Note: WIA has run a couple of stories recently on this topic, and it’s important for VSEA members to remember that Vermont actually ranks dead last in the nation in terms of retiree savings, making your VSEA-negotiated defined benefit plans all the more important.

USW Blasts Harley-Davidson Announcement That It Will Open A New Manufacturing Plant In… Thailand?

The New York Times reports on May 23 that American manufacturing icon Harley-Davidson has caught the offshoring fever and is building a new plant in Thailand, where motorcycles will be manufactured for sale in Europe.

“It’s a slap in the face to the U.S. workers who built an American icon,” says Robert Martinez Jr., the international president of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers. The union represents Harley-Davidson workers at plants including one in York, Pa., where the company plans to lay off over 100 workers.

The United Steelworkers of America also represents Harley-Davidson workers, and the union released a statement this week in response to the NYT story, writing:

“Harley-Davidson has been the crown jewel of American manufacturing. It’s an iconic brand that represents true American spirit. Management’s decision to offshore production is a slap in the face to the American worker and to hundreds of thousands of Harley riders across the country.

This decision puts in jeopardy one of the few remaining genuine U.S. brands.

Our members have been true partners with this company, working in good times and bad to make great products that fostered its growth and success. We remember the U.S. government stepping up in the 1980s to save Harley-Davidson and contributing to its revival.

Harley owners and prospective buyers across the globe want to continue to enjoy machines made in America that provide quality rides and unique experiences. Harley’s potential outsourcing of production puts all of this at risk.

Offshoring production is the wrong path to prosperity. It puts in jeopardy the success that has propelled Harley over the years: It is a brand of excellence that enables riders to confidently know that they are joining a special community of enthusiasts.

“Harley-Davidson should abandon their offshoring plans and expand their operations here in America.”

To help VSEA more effectively reach active members—and really all those members who want to know what’s going on in their union—VSEA will be working hard in the coming months to collect members’ emails on its own and begin to build contact lists that cannot be altered by a State download.

You can help us get started by clicking here and signing up for the VSEA communications you are interested in receiving.

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