|
|
Brothers & Sisters,
Negotiations Update
Local 1014 Executive Board Bargaining Team met with County CEO representatives again last week to drive our members’ issues. Each Union bargains independently for their individual units issues such as EMT pay, Dispatcher EMD pay, Fit for Life pay, and special bonuses to name a few.
We are also in alliance with our partners from the Coalition of County Unions (CCU). We use the power of the County Unions to leverage bargaining for our Fringe Benefits including increased medical dental and vision premium and retirement benefits as well as other such benefits affecting all.
This year, we have formed a special pact with ALL County Unions to include Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and the CCU to help drive the COLA as high as we can get it to help offset the rising costs of living we are all experiencing. This is a historic and unprecedented partnership leveraging the power of over 130,000 Union Workers. We have also enlisted the support of the LA Federation of Labor - representing over 850,000 Union workers in LA County and LA City for our political action and lobbying efforts to secure this contract. The power and strength of all Unions will be needed to get this done, and we are resolved to accept and recommend to you a fair and just contract. We have put forward a formal demand to the BOS and CEO in cooperation with the LA Federation of Labor.
The CCU represents workers from Fire, Lifeguard, Sheriffs Deputies and Managers, Probation Officers, Public Defender Investigators, CAPE Professional Employees and Attorneys, County Interpreters, Medical Doctors Interns and Residents, Los Angeles and Orange County Building Trades, International Operating Engineers, Teamsters Local 911, and Union of Physicians and Dentists. This diverse and powerful group of Unions work together to bargain our fringe benefits contract.
We want to alert our members early, that this contract battle will likely take some job actions. We will keep you posted on our work to stand in solidarity with all in the effort.
Our first CALL TO ACTION will be on Tuesday, March 31st when workers from all the allied Unions will converge on Grand Park Next to Hahn Hall to carry our message loud and publicly as this fight takes shape. We are asking our members to wear blue work pants and we will provide Local 1014 shirts.
Additional details will be put out as we near the event. Vice President Lew Currier will be coordinating the list of people attending. Mark your calendar and come join us as we make our voice heard.
|
|
SOLIDARITY! SI SE PUEDE! COALITION OF COUNTY UNIONS
Lead negotiator Blaine Meek is retiring from the Coalition of County Unions (CCU) after more than three decades of work on our behalf. An attorney by trade, Blaine Meek is also a representative of the California Association of Professional Employees (CAPE) and the chairperson for the CCU representing all County workers.
 Blaine Meek has dedicated his life to not only his own members but our Local 1014 members at each and every fight and campaign to secure and protect benefits and worker’s rights rules. We owe Chairman Blaine Meek a debt of gratitude. We congratulate Blaine on a job well done, and a life of service to others, and wish him an amazing retirement where the benefits we bargain so hard for will provide well for his family.
President GIllotte has been elected by the Unions of the CCU to take over as Chair and Lead Negotiator for the CCU and to finish handling the COVID Vaccine Mandate issue. Vice Presidents Lew Currier and Kurt Kobler represent Local 1014 at the CCU table and we have involved all members of the Executive Board so that all are involved in our work. This is temporary to get the CCU through Fringe Bargaining and finish the Covid Vaccine Mandate issue. We look forward to our fight to land a fair fringe contract for our members.
COVID Vaccine Mandate Update
A quick recap of where we are at with the Covid Vaccine Mandate. We have 3,300 members affected by the vaccine mandate. Local 1014 has been rock solid on our position on the vaccine mandate, we support the vaccine and its positive effects to protect our members and the public, but we have opposed the mandate, and taken the position of “Vaccinate or Accommodate”. This position has consistently been upheld by the Federal and State Courts.
Our members have been safely guided to where we are at now with NO MEMBERS put off work for any time, and a small handful of members facing discipline. We want to be very clear also that the proposed discipline we battle now is for FAILURE TO REGISTER and TEST, not for failure to vaccinate. We have a negotiated path for our members for medical and religious exemptions with regular job duty accommodations that may or may not require periodic testing.
We have had over 200 exemptions filed and only 4 denied as of now, with an appeal process in motion for the 4 and any others that come up with most denials requiring additional information. We strongly encourage all members to REGISTER and stay in the process. While we push to end the mandate, we are not at a point in time where the mandate is gone, and as of now, it is in full force and effect.
As we continue to battle with the County on the mandate, we also must comply with the exemption orders. It is time for our members to submit their requests for exemptions to the County on the forms provided online. Click here to view EA 437 and fill out forms.
We have previously put out guidelines from our attorney, Adams, Ferrone & Ferrone, a strong labor law firm, on the specifics of the exemption provisions. Please take time to prepare and get your exemptions submitted to the County.
We have been working with Chief Marrone on this issue, and he has been extremely cooperative and agile in working with us to navigate this difficult process. He will be in charge of the Vaccine Mandate by delegated authority from the Fire Chief. We encourage all members to get their exemptions filed ASAP as we also navigate the County move to centralize human resources and compliance to Big County.
Please feel free to contact the Union and we will make available our legal counsel to help with any questions or concerns on the exemption filing. We continue to stay in contact with LA Free and their attorney as one last constitutional challenge takes shape, however, to date, no legal challenges to the constitutionality of the order have prevailed. Be smart and fight strategically if you are not vaccinated. Register, file for an exemption, and navigate with us all down the road a bit more as things change rapidly to favor the order revocation.
We have also put forward to the Fire Chief alternative plans in place of any intent to discharge employees for any aspect of this rule, and he is pressed with thinking those proposals through. We will keep you posted as we press on the Chief and the Department. Make no mistake we also have Union representation and legal counsel employed as well. Please continue to remain United, and supportive of all members, vaccinated or not, in our commitment to get everyone to the other side of this issue. We are all one and with a smart strategic fight, we can all prevail.
Operational Issues Department / Management Talks
Many issues have been discussed and updated with the Fire Chief upon his return. We are due answers within the next couple of weeks on the 48/96 Trial Shift Schedule proposal, an item that we believe should garner Fire Chief and Management support. We will all finally deal with the time together and in finality with professional and guided evaluation. We look forward to the next steps in pursuing this trial and we look forward to the Fire Chief's formal position on the trial as we move to the BOS with our proposal. We would prefer and earnestly have requested a partnership with the Fire Chief on this important membership and family issue.
We have also agreed to set a meeting with workers' compensation subject matter experts from both Labor and Management to address the CRISIS in return to work and staffing impact items that are crippling our service and our members' health. The impact of having 300 or more members off each month is felt in many ways.
We cannot continue to sustain these numbers and we must act to change how things are done to correct course. The Department and the Union met long ago to formally craft a workers compensation carve-out memorandum of understanding removing us from the broken state work comp system. Many good things happened as a result. It is time to renew progressive ways to get our members treated and back to work, and to reduce these costs.
We are a self-funded workers' compensation system with the Fire Chief as the responsible CEO of administering the plan. He can approve policies and procedures that we negotiate to aid in the treatment of our members and the retirement of our members. We look forward to the work to make real substantive changes for treatment policies and procedures, service-connected disability retirement issues, insurance issues, and coordination of treatment benefits. We will report after our first meeting.
|
|
In Solidarity,
President Dave Gillotte and the Local 1014 Executive Board |
|
|
|
|
|
|
