July
23, 2017
From:
The Federation of Connecticut Taxpayer Org
Contact: Susan Kniep,
President
Website: http://ctact.org/
Email: fctopresident@aol.com
Telephone: 860-841-8032
SECRET DEALS, SECRET PUBLIC
SECTOR UNION CONTRACTS WHICH WE HAVE JUST
LEARNED THE STATE EMPLOYEE UNIONS HAVE RATIFIED
Read what others are saying
regarding the State Employee Union Contracts
and Keep this in Mind. Once these contracts are signed, sealed and delivered to
the State Employee Unions they will become LEGALLY BINDING CONTRACTS.Binding
upon Connecticut Homeowners and Businesses to Pay regardless if State
Legislators, Governor Malloy or those who formulated the contracts made a
mistake in calculations or verbiage within the contracts. So ask yourself - Why
have these state employee union contracts been withheld from the Republicans
elected to the State Legislature and you, the Connecticut taxpayers, who will be forced to
fund these contracts???
BREAKING NEWS
by Christine Stuart of CTNewsJunkie.com
Excerpts: The five year deal includes job protection
for four years to bargaining groups that agree to a three year wage freeze and
three furlough days, and a 3.5 percent pay increase in the final two years. In
addition it increases employee contributions to health and pension benefits and
is expected to save the state $1.57 billion over the next two years and $24
billion over the next 20 years, according to an actuarial report.
This deal guarantees unsustainable benefits
for state unions for the next decade said Yankee Institute President Carol
Platt Liebau. For the rest of us, it guarantees
budget deficits and by limiting future options virtually guarantees future tax increases.Continue reading at
http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/archives/entry/unions_ratify_labor_savings_general_assembly_up_next/
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Yet, as of 5 PM last evening,
July 17, 2017, Republican legislators and the public were denied access to
these contracts as highlighted by CTNewsJunkie.com in its article captioned
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Also on July 17, 2017, Senate
Republican President Pro Tempore Len Fasano (R-North
Haven) released the following:
Fasano
Asks Governors Administration to Stop Refusing
to Release Proposed Labor Contracts
Hartford Senate
Republican President Pro Tempore Len Fasano (R-North
Haven) released the following statement today regarding Governor Dannel P. Malloy’s administrations refusal to release
proposed labor contracts to the state legislature.The
governor has recently negotiated a state employee concessions deal with union
leaders, and the Senate Republican caucus has requested over 20 tentative
agreements for each bargaining unit multiple times beginning on July 6,
including a request pursuant to the states Freedom of Information laws.
Lawmakers are expected to vote to approve or reject the concessions deal.
Not releasing these contracts makes me
question, and should make every legislator question, what is in them that the
administration does not want us to see. From the few contracts that are
already public, we see many increased costs. We need to know what we are voting
on before we actually vote. To withhold these documents from any member of the
legislature is an affront to transparency. I again am asking for these
documents, this time publicly, in the hopes that requests from my office will
be responded to immediately. If union members have access to these contracts
which they are voting on today, why do lawmakers who also have to vote on these
contracts not have the same access? We need to spend time analyzing these
documents so we can fully understand what benefits are changing and which are
staying the same. That takes time. There
is no reason why documents that have been shared with individual unions should
not also be shared with the public and especially lawmakers
who have the same obligation to review, assess and vote on the labor deal.
**********************
On July 17, 2017 CTNewsJunkie.com reported
Republicans Clarify Changes They Want
to Make To Labor; Unions Warn Against Them
by
Christine Stuart | Jul 17, 2017 5:29am
(42) Comments | Log in to Facebook to Post a Comment
Posted to: Labor, State Budget, Special Session, Pensions
HARTFORD, CT In case there was any
confusion, House Minority Leader Themis Klarides wrote lawmakers to make sure they understood that
she wants to change the states relationship with labor. The changes she is
seeking would, for all intent and purpose, circumvent collective bargaining as
it is conducted today for state employees.
Under current law, the legislature cannot
make wholesale changes to existing union contracts Klarides
wrote. The House
Republicans are proposing to reform collective bargaining so that the
legislature can implement workplace policies that are more closely aligned with
the private sector. Continue reading at http://www.ctnewsjunkie.com/archives/entry/republicans_clarify_changes_to_labor_labor_warns_against_them/
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On July 6, 2017 the following appeared in the Waterbury Republican
Newspaper.
Unsustainable have you seen this
editorial
The deal has a number of troubling aspects,
but the hardest one to stomach is a provision that would extend, from 2022
through 2027, the master agreement protecting unionized state employees health
and retirement benefits.
In 1997, then-Gov. John G. Rowland and
SEBAC signed the original version. It was supposed to expire this year, but in
2011, Gov. Malloy and SEBAC extended it to 2022. http://ctsenaterepublicans.com/2017/07/unsustainable-have-you-seen-this-editorial/#.WW4WNY-cF88
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Also view Bob
Williams, President of State Budget Solutions article
captioned
Concessions to Connecticuts
Public Employee Unions Erode Value of Reforms in Tentative Deal
Therein, Mr. Williams notes
In the end, the agreement will result in
$1.5 billion in savings over the next two years compared with the originally
projected state spending levels. But with a projected $5 billion deficit over
the next two years, this $1.5 billion in savings represents just a partial
budget solution for the state with the third worst credit rating in the
nation. Locking the state into a contract for up to a decade could
worsen, rather than alleviate, the fiscal crises. Simply embracing the pension
reforms and a temporary salary freeze without this long-term benefits agreement
is a more prudent course of action.
Read Mr. Williams complete article at http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/concessions-to-public-sector-unions-erode-value-of_us_59600fcbe4b08f5c97d069c5
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Recently, the Yankee
Institute reported
Union deal could saddle Connecticut
with 30 year labor contract
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Also Read
So
how much are we paying our State employees and State retirees!
Click
on the following and browse
http://openpayroll.ct.gov/#!/year/2016/card/highest_paid_employee
And also check out http://transparency.ct.gov/html/main.asp