Conn. Unions Fear Political Clout Has Suffered

By Susan Haigh

Associated Press

HARTFORD — State employee unions in Connecticut might not just lose 6,500 jobs after recently rejecting a labor savings and concessions agreement. They’re also risking their considerable clout with the General Assembly.

The Democratic-controlled General Assembly has long had a reputation of being friendly to organized labor. But after the deal failed in June, some reliable allies chastised workers for shooting down a package that included a three-year wage freeze and pension and health care changes, but also guaranteed future pay raises, protection of health and retirement benefits, and a four-year, no-layoff promise.

Democratic Senator Edith Prague, the veteran co-chairwoman of the labor committee, told reporters she felt state employees “were out of their minds” and “stupid” not to ratify the deal.

Union leaders say they felt the sting from lawmakers this week when the state Senate passed a bill on a bipartisan vote to roll back some of the workers’ future benefits.

Governor Dannel P. Malloy and Senate Democratic leaders echoed minority Republican leaders in saying that, with or without a concessions agreement, some benefit changes must be made to fix a retirement system that’s financially untenable.

The House of Representatives didn’t vote on the bill, though it reserved the right to do so later, but the message from lawmakers was heard by union leaders.

“Two weeks ago, I didn’t think this could look like Wisconsin, and all of a sudden it feels a little bit like that,” said Sal Luciano, executive director of AFSCME Council 4. Luciano was referring to the controversial and heavily protested new Wisconsin law that strips many of the collective bargaining rights of almost all public employees.

Luciano said many of Connecticut’s unionized state employees believe they’ve been unfairly blamed for the state’s financial problems, and he’s unsure whether the current rift between the workers and lawmakers will become a long-term problem.

“I hope it doesn’t,” he said. “I hope reasonable people get to together and work this out.”

Mark Lucey, a lieutenant with the Department of Correction who supported the labor savings and concessions agreement, said he’s seen firsthand the fruits of good relations with lawmakers, crediting Prague for pushing legislation that allowed DOC captains and lieutenants to unionize.

He’s particularly concerned that the unions’ bond with lawmakers has been damaged.

“One would assume that maybe there is some damage done, but we just hope it’s not catastrophic,” he said. “We hope it’s something that we can hopefully repair.”

Lawmakers and Malloy had high expectations that a labor deal could be reached earlier with the state’s 54,000 unionized workers. In early May, against the wishes of the minority Republicans and some Democrats, they passed a two-year, $40.1 billion budget that left a hole for the labor savings. Malloy warned at the time that layoffs would be necessary if a deal wasn’t reached, and said he wouldn’t raise taxes beyond the $2.6 billion already in the two-year budget.

Even though 57 percent of the voting members supported the agreement, it failed because it was rejected by four out of 15 unions. At least 14 out of 15 member unions must vote to support any changes to the existing 20-year health and retirement benefit agreement that’s in place until 2017, under the rules of the State Employees Bargaining Agent Coalition.

SEBAC leaders have ruled out revoting the old deal, saying that would be offensive and unfair to members who voted No. But Luciano said changes could be made that satisfy both the members and Malloy, though the governor has said he won’t renegotiate the agreement.

Matt O’Connor, a SEBAC spokesman, said the leaders’ top priority is to stop the layoffs, saying they’d be devastating to the workers, their families, state services and the state economy. But he said they also want to make amends with the lawmakers, and make sure that labor-friendly Connecticut won’t start looking like other states that have gone to battle with their public employee unions.

“It’s clear that [lawmakers] were expecting the solution to have been put in place by now, and they were expecting this agreement to pass,” he said. “What we’re telling them is we’re confident we’re going to come up with a resolution. It’s not as fast as everyone wanted, but we’ll get there.”