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George Will Supreme Court must keep unions in check
George Will is a nationally syndicated columnist.

   Democracy is rule by persuasion, but the unpersuasive often try to coerce the unpersuaded. Recent days have provided two illustrations of this tendency, both of them pertaining to labor unions, whose decades of declining membership testify to their waning power to persuade workers that unions add more value to workers’ lives than they subtract.
   Failing unions, like failing industries, turn to government for protection in the form of coercion. Failing industries have traditionally sought corporate welfare in the form of tariffs (coercion of consumers). Unions seek laws to confer what their persuasiveness cannot convince people to consent to.
   Last Thursday, the Supreme Court ruled 9-0 against the Washington Education Association (WEA), Washington state’s teachers union, which was claiming a perverse government-conferred entitlement. Five days later, organized labor and its political allies, including she who would be president, marched in Washington, D.C. They were asking Congress to deny to workers, whom unions are trying to organize, the right to a secret ballot. Both cases also illustrate the increasingly casual resort to abridgements of the rights of free speech and association.
   Many states, including Washington, allow “agency shop” agreements whereby unions can levy fees on public employees who choose not to join a union but are represented by the union in collective bargaining. Thirty years ago the Supreme Court held that nonmembers cannot be forced to pay the portion of union fees that are used not for collective bargaining but for political activities. Often states have “opt out” provisions, whereby nonmembers are required to request that the political portion of their fees be refunded.
   About 3,500 of Washington state’s approximately 70,000 teachers choose not to join the WEA, which made opting out a tedious chore. To get their refund — about 25 percent of their fees — the nonmembers had to follow procedures detailed in six pages of arcane instructions.
   In 1992, however, Washington voters approved by referendum an “opt in” rule. Unions were forbidden to use nonmembers’ fees “to influence an election or to operate a political committee, unless affi rmatively authorized by the individual.”
   Amazingly, the WEA persuaded the state Supreme Court that requiring it to ask permission before using other people’s money — for political speech that those people do not want to finance — was an unconstitutional burden on the WEA’s right of free speech. This novel, to be polite, theory did not persuade even one of the nine often fractious justices of the U.S. Supreme Court.
   Speaking for the court, Justice Antonin Scalia noted that when government allows agency-shop arrangements, it creates a remarkable entitlement: It gives a private entity, a public employees union, “the power, in essence, to tax government employees.” The WEA’s complaint — a notably brazen example of the entitlement mentality — was against the supposedly burdensome “opt in” condition placed on its exercise of that power. With understandable asperity, Scalia said: “The notion that this modest limitation upon an extraordinary benefit violates the First Amendment is, to say the least, counterintuitive.”
   The WEA’s whiny audacity was not more offensive than the aim organized labor tried to advance with Tuesday’s march and rally in the nation’s capital. Unions were demonstrating in support of legislation with the Orwellian title “Employee Free Choice Act.” It would deny employees the choice of a secret ballot when voting on unionization of their workplace. Instead, union organizers would use the “card check” system, which allows them to pick the voters they want: Once a majority of workers — exposed one at a time to face-to-face pressure from union organizers — sign a union card, the union is automatically certified as the bargaining agent for all the workers.
   The Supreme Court has said that the card-check system is “admittedly inferior to the election process.” Hillary Clinton, who has given herself a makeover as a moderate, and who was elected by secret ballots, and who hopes that next year voters will use their secret ballots to give to her the power to nominate Supreme Court justices, nevertheless toes labor’s line when she advocates abolishing workers’ right to a secret ballot. Abolition, she says, will “create a fair and level playing field between workers and employers.”
   When in March the House passed card-check legislation for unpersuasive unions, a principal sponsor was George Miller, D-Calif., who in 2001 wrote, with 15 colleagues, to Mexican officials, on behalf of the rights of Mexican workers, insisting “that the secret ballot is absolutely necessary in order to ensure that workers are not intimidated into voting for a union they might not otherwise choose.” Now, that is persuasive.  

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since the trade unions earlier won from the state Legislature a requirement that all public construction projects have to pay union wages (misleadingly called "prevailing wages").

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Honestly...if it weren't for the unions (PRIVATE SECTOR UNIONS ONLY), some industries wouldn't be making the money they do today. It truly does help the economic system.

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Faith a reason not
to pay union dues
   COLUMBUS, Ohio — A Roman Catholic teacher whose religious beliefs conflict with the political positions of her labor union cannot be forced to pay dues, a federal judge ruled.
   U.S. District Judge Gregory Frost’s ruling broadens the category of employees who may opt out of unions because of religious beliefs beyond Seventh-day Adventists and Mennonites.
   In his ruling last week, Frost struck down the Ohio law that held only members of religions that “historically held conscientious objections” to union membership could opt out. The judge said anyone with demonstrated religious beliefs should be exempt from paying dues to unions whose positions they find objectionable.
   The law discriminated among religions by recognizing the Seventh-day Adventist and Mennonite objections to joining unions while denying the same right to others, the judge said.

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In his ruling last week, Frost struck down the Ohio law that held only members of religions that “historically held conscientious objections” to union membership could opt out. The judge said anyone with demonstrated religious beliefs should be exempt from paying dues to unions whose positions they find objectionable.

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Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Quoted from BIGK75

Some jobs, you're just told that you will be.  Guess it depends on the employer and the union.

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SUNY researchers allowed to unionize
NLRB rules students are covered under law
BY JASON SUBIK Gazette Reporter

   The National Labor Relations Board has ruled that research assistants working on State University of New York campuses, including about 500 at the University at Albany, may now form collective bargaining units.
   CWA Local 1104 Executive Vice President Kathleen Sims said her union, which first petitioned the NLRB to allow a research assistant union vote at UAlbany in 2002, plans to hold a rally at noon today, despite objections from SUNY officials, in front of the Center for Environmental Sciences and Technology Management. The building is part of the nanocollege complex off Washington Avenue where most of the research assistants work.
   UAlbany spokesman Michael Parker said the college has offered its campus center as an alternative location because the CESTM building and the land around it are controlled by the Fuller Road Management Corp. Sims said the grounds are public property and the rally will go ahead.
   “This is a rare decision for labor these days,” Sims said of the NLRB ruling. “We have a First Amendment right to be there.”
   The NLRB decision, made June 29, classified research assistants working for the Research Foundation of SUNY Sponsored Programs as “statutory employees” covered under the National Labor Relations Act, reversing a 2005 judgement by NLRB Acting Regional Director Rhonda Aliouat. She found the assistants to be students engaged in a primarily educational activity.
   Research Foundation of SUNY officials released an e-mail reacting to the decision on Tuesday.
   “We received some unexpected news last week regarding our 2003-2005 graduate student union cases,” wrote Research Foundation Vice President of Human Resources Lynn Manning. “The cases have been remanded to the [NLRB] regional office, and we are working with them to establish dates, locations in the next week or so to open the ballots.”
   Union votes held at UAlbany in 2002, SUNY Buffalo in 2003 and the SUNY College of Environmental Science and Forestry at Syracuse in 2004 were impounded when the Research Foundation appealed earlier rulings that allowed the votes.
   “Until the votes are counted, no one knows whether the majority of students who cast ballots in these elections that occurred three to five years ago were supportive of a union,” Manning wrote.
   According to the Research Foundation’s Web site, it is not supportive of unions because if the foundation’s work force were to become unionized . . . “costs to campuses would increase substantially. Central offi ce will have to hire or contract with experts in collective bargaining and union negotiation. Additional costs for specialized external labor counsel are also likely.”
   Graduate assistants and teaching assistants, who sometimes teach classes and grade papers, have long been unionized throughout the SUNY system, but up until now research assistants who work for the Research Foundation of SUNY, which is a private nonprofit “educational corporation” created in 1977 separate from SUNY, have not been. The assistants are graduate students who apply for work on grant-funded research projects paid for in part by private corporations for whom the research may benefit. They sign patent waivers and can be fired at will by the Research Foundation.
   “There was a research assistant who testified here at Albany that said ‘I get one check from the Research Foundation and one check from IBM, and it has nothing to do with my dissertation,’ ” Sims said.
   Testimony from research assistants at SUNY Buffalo in 2003 indicates that most assistants work about 20 hours a week during the school year for between $15,000 and $30,000. Some students testified that as much as 90 percent of the research they did related directly to their doctoral dissertations, while others said it had no baring or an “incidental” relationship to their graduate studies.
   In the NLRB decision, the majority concluded that the Research Foundation of SUNY is not an educational institution and does not issue degrees.
   “Moreover, the undisputed evidence demonstrates the existence of an economic relationship between the [assistants] and the [Research Foundation] rather than an educational relationship,” wrote board members Peter Kirsanow and Dennis Walsh.
   NLRB Chairman Robert Battista dissented from the decision. He concluded that all of the assistants were doctoral candidates who “. .. must do research to get that degree, and that research must be done through the [Research Foundation].”
   The board’s decision clarifies its 2004 ruling in a case of Brown University graduate assistants wanting to form a union. In the Brown case, the NLRB reversed precedent that viewed anyone in a “master to servant” relationship to be covered by the National Labor Relations Act and established a student exemption in instances where the labor was for primarily educational purposes. Aliouat had cited Brown when ordering the union votes remain impounded.
   “What this means is there’s a new precedent in the higher education industry and that’s what really lights up my Christmas tree,” Sims said. “We are cautiously optimistic about the votes.”
   Research Foundation officials have questioned the validity of votes held among graduate students long graduated.
   “It is significant to note that the vast majority of the students who voted in the three elections at UB, UA and ESF are no longer at those campuses,” Manning wrote. “It is unknown how current students would feel about having a union representative imposed on them without having the opportunity to participate in a union election.”
   CWA Local 1104 Attorney Mark Pearce said U.S. labor law does not allow retroactive benefits to past research assistants, but also makes valid their collective bargaining vote even if they are no longer employed by the Research Foundation.
   “It would be against public policy to allow employees to be victimized by the protracted nature of the process,” he said.
   Pearce said the Research Foundation could, in effect, appeal the NLRB ruling by refusing to contract with the collective bargaining units, which would trigger an NLRB prosecution, the results of which could be appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals.

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Union sues over retired workers’ benefits
BY KATHY PARKER Gazette Reporter
Reach Gazette reporter Kathy Parker at 885-6705 or kparker@dailygazette.net.

   The CSEA had filed a grievance on behalf of the retirees and an arbitrator had been named to hear the case, Phinney said, so he was surprised when he was served with court papers saying the union was suing.
   “I guess this could actually turn out better if a judge decides it,” he said. “We have been paying for years, but since 1986, the contract has included the word ‘or.’ ”
   He said the payment of both insurance premiums has cost the village about $33,000 a year and it’s not yet known how much of a savings could be realized by having retirees pick one or the other.
   “I think most people will take the insurance we have,” Phinney said.
   Assalian said it’s not known how many retirees have been impacted by the change in policy. Two former employees were named in the suit, but Assalian said it is a class action suit covering any former village employee with benefits.
regular health insurance and Medicare Part B but in March sent a letter to the retirees telling them they had to choose one or the other,” Assalian said.
   Mayor Robert Phinney said the letters were sent after village trustees discovered that they had made an error in paying both.
   “For 15 years or more, the village had been paying both, my mistake. The contact
   The Civil Service Employees Association representing retired South Glens Falls workers has filed a lawsuit against the village claiming that insurance payments have been illegally cut.
   Therese Assalian, spokeswoman for the CSEA, said a class action suit was filed against the village in state Supreme Court in Saratoga County last week.
   “The village has always paid for both
   The town retirees named in the suit are John Dixon and Marvin Millington.
   Millington said the Medicaid deductions will cost him about $1,000 a year.
   “The village makes the deduction out of my check now where they had been paying it. I signed a form allowing for a payroll deduction, but the village was reimbursing it. I don’t know why they changed things mid-stream,” he said. language states we can pay for one or the other and gave the employee the choice of which,” Phinney said.  

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SCHENECTADY COUNTY
Staffing dispute figures in CSEA talks
County may drop appeal if negotiation can solve Glendale issue
BY MICHAEL LAMENDOLA Gazette Reporter

   County negotiations with its unionized workers are focused on health benefits, according to a spokesman, but include an attempt to sort out a weekend staffing dispute at the Glendale Home.
   That dispute has been in contention since 2005, has now moved to the state appeals level, and shapes part of the talks with the CSEA for a new contract, according to Christopher Gardner, county attorney.
   The issue emerged recently when a state Supreme Court judge upheld an arbitrator’s ruling that Schenectady County violated a union contract in trying to meet a state mandate at the Glendale Home.
   State Supreme Court Judge Vincent J. Reilly Jr.’s June 5 decision requires the county to rescind any changes it made to its collective bargaining agreement with Local 847 of the Civil Service Employees Association.
   Gardner said the county is appealing Reilly’s ruling with the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court. At the same time, he said, the county is attempting to address issues that led to the defi - ciency through negotiations with the CSEA.
   The state Department of Health in 2005 cited the Glendale Home for failing to provide planned activities for residents on weekends. At the time the deficiency was issued, the county was providing part-time activities for residents.
   The state said the county had to provide full-time weekend activities or else face fines, possible closure or both. In response, the county changed or eliminated shifts, benefits and overtime, and also required exempt employees to work weekends.
   The union filed a grievance against the “unilateral violation of the agreement,” said CSEA spokeswoman Therese Assalian. An arbitrator sided with the CSEA. However, the county refused to comply with the arbitrator’s decision and the union brought the matter to court.
   Reilly rejected the county’s contention that the arbitrator’s ruling was faulty because it “conflicted with other laws or affected public policy, was totally irrational or clearly exceeded a specifically enumerated limitation on the arbitrator’s power.”
   Assalian said the arbitrator’s decision and Reilly’s ruling “upheld the validity of an agreement that was agreed to by both parties and has been in place and worked well for over a decade. The agreement was the result of a grievance settlement that came about through the assistance of a mediator.”
   Assalian said the county could have addressed the state deficiency “without violating the agreement.” Reilly agreed, saying nothing in the arbitrator’s decision prohibited the county from adding additional staffing to meet state requirements.
   Gardner said the county has since corrected the deficiency by “redeploying existing staff and by increasing staff.” He also said the county would withdraw its appeal of Reilly’s ruling if it and the CSEA are able to resolve weekend staffing issues through contract negotiations.
   The county has been negotiating with the local CSEA unit since its four-year contract expired in January. The CSEA represents 800 employees at the Glendale Home, Schenectady County Community College, the public library, Department of Social Services, the Schenectady Job Training Agency, as well as county nurses and highway workers.
   The county also is negotiating with the 200-member Service Employees International Union Local 1199, the 25-member SEIU Local 721, the 150-member Sheriff’s Benevolent Association and a smaller unit of correction officers.
   The county’s work force numbers approximately 1,800.
   Gardner said a top issue is health care. “We’ve been through most of the health care issues. The unions have been responsible and responsive,” he said.
   He refused to discuss other issues, saying the county and unions have imposed a news blackout.

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Gardner said the county is appealing Reilly’s ruling with the Appellate Division of state Supreme Court. At the same time, he said, the county is attempting to address issues that led to the defi - ciency through negotiations with the CSEA.
   The state Department of Health in 2005 cited the Glendale Home for failing to provide planned activities for residents on weekends. At the time the deficiency was issued, the county was providing part-time activities for residents.    The state said the county had to provide full-time weekend activities or else face fines, possible closure or both. In response, the county changed or eliminated shifts, benefits and overtime, and also required exempt employees to work weekends.    The union filed a grievance against the “unilateral violation of the agreement,” said CSEA spokeswoman Therese Assalian. An arbitrator sided with the CSEA. However, the county refused to comply with the arbitrator’s decision and the union brought the matter to court.

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UAW pointing to non-labor expenses in contract dispute
Detroit automakers aim to bridge cost gap with Japan firms
BY TOM KRISHER The Associated Press

   DETROIT — As bargainers for the United Auto Workers and domestic automakers try to reach a new contract, Kenneth Cooksey is one of many workers who doesn’t understand why the companies are so focused on the cost of labor.
   By most accounts, labor expenses for General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC amount to about 10 percent of the price of a new vehicle, including wages, benefits and “legacy” costs for retiree pensions and health care.
   So Cooksey, a 37-year Ford worker from Detroit, doesn’t buy the companies’ logic that they have to erase a roughly $25-per-hour labor cost gap with their Japanese competitors — Toyota Motor Corp., Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co.
   “We can’t help it [that] the foreigners don’t have the legacy costs because they just came over,” said Cooksey, who works at a plant just west of Detroit that assembles the Focus small car.
   Nissan, Honda and Toyota all pay about the same wages as the Detroit Three. The companies say the cost gap comes in other areas such as health care for active and retired workers, absenteeism, paid days off, and the jobs bank, in which workers get most of their pay when laid off.
   By some accounts, the biggest chunk of that $25 the companies want to shave is in retiree health care.
   But the union likely will focus the contract talks on the nonlabor costs of building cars and trucks, much of which is controlled by the companies. The current pacts with the Detroit Three expire Sept. 14.
   “The vast majority of the costs of producing a vehicle and transporting it to a dealership and preparing it for sale — including design, engineering, marketing, raw materials, executive compensation and other costs — are not related to direct or indirect manufacturing labor,” the UAW said in a fact book written for reporters covering the talks.
   However, the domestic automakers pay $1,200 to $1,500 per car just for health care, a huge competitive difference that has to be addressed, said Laurie Harbour-Felax, managing director at Stout Risius Ross Inc., a financial and strategic advisory company.
   “We’ll never be able to compete in the same situation with the Japanese because they don’t have the same issues,” said Harbour-Felax, who wrote a study that found a $2,400 profit gap per vehicle between the Detroit Three and the Japanese automakers.
   About half the gap can be attributed to the labor cost difference, she said.
   Retiree costs are one reason Ford, Chrysler and GM lost a combined $15 billion last year. Although Ford and GM recently turned profits, they’re still losing money in North America.
   The Detroit Three have a combined unfunded retiree health care obligation of about $90.5 billion, a staggering number that must be carried on their books and paid over the life of their employees. With far fewer retirees, the Japanese companies have much lower payments.
   On the bargaining table is the domestic companies’ desire to reduce or get rid of that giant obligation, perhaps by funding a UAW-run trust that would pay retiree health care bills.
   Still, the domestic automakers have a lot they can do to become more efficient to reduce costs and close the profit gap with the Japanese automakers, Harbour-Felax said.
   Among the inefficiencies, which all three say they are working to reduce, is the lack of standardized parts globally. Ford, GM and Chrysler have multiple parts that are unique to one model, while Toyota and Honda have standardized parts for nearly all models.
   The Detroit Three also are less efficient because they don’t build as many cars on shared underpinnings, nor do they design and engineer as many models for sale globally, she said.  

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State, unions holding contract talks
CSEA, PEF among negotiating units at the bargaining table
BY BOB CONNER Gazette Reporter
Reach Gazette reporter Bob Conner at 462-2499 or bconner@dailygazette.net.

   The Civil Service Employees Association resumed contract negotiations with the state this week after walking away from them in late June.
   CSEA spokesman Steve Madarasz said the union is hoping the resumed talks will prove more fruitful than the negotiations that started in April and were interrupted on June 29 because “we just weren’t getting much in the way of feedback” from the state. CSEA’s previous contract expired at the end of March.
   Craig Dickinson, spokesman for the Governor’s Office of Employee Relations, declined to comment on the union’s claims.
   The state is currently engaged in negotiations with most of its unionized employees, almost all of whom are working under the terms of expired contracts. Dickinson said negotiations are under way with CSEA, the Public Employees Federation, and unions representing police officers and correction officers. Negotiations with unions representing college teachers are on hold until the start of the school year, and a union jurisdictional dispute is delaying the start of talks between the state and representatives of state police investigators.
   Darcy Wells, spokeswoman for PEF, said that in addition to contract issues, it is also concerned about the proposed moves of state data-processing employees and food lab workers from the Capital Region to the Utica and Geneva areas, respectively. The union opposes the moves, which were announced in the waning days of Gov. George Pataki’s administration. The moves are supported by political leaders from the Utica and Geneva areas and opposed by some from the Capital Region. The Spitzer administration has yet to make its position clear.
   On Wednesday, Spitzer s p o k e s w o m a n C h r i s t i n e Pritchard said the state does intend to establish a new data center, and the possibility of doing so in the Utica area remains “under review.” She could not provide information about the possible food lab move.
   Wells said PEF is also hoping that the Senate will pass and the governor sign a bill passed by the Assembly that would ban employers from forcing nurses to work overtime.
   Both CSEA and PEF provide information about the status of contract negotiations on their Web sites. Dickinson said the state’s policy is not to comment on those matters.  

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Dickinson said negotiations are under way with CSEA, the Public Employees Federation, and unions representing police officers and correction officers.

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Both CSEA and PEF provide information about the status of contract negotiations on their Web sites. Dickinson said the state’s policy is not to comment on those matters.

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CAPITOL
Spitzer vetoes union-backed bills
Legislation sought to protect retiree health benefits
BY BOB CONNER Gazette Reporter
Reach Gazette reporter Bob Conner at 462-2499 or bconner@dailygazette.net.

   Gov. Eliot Spitzer vetoed several bills this week that were backed by public employee unions, the most significant of which would have prevented state and local governments from reducing the health benefits of retirees unless a corresponding reduction were made in the benefits of active workers.
   The two bills protecting retiree health benefits were sponsored in the Senate by Sen. Hugh Farley, R-Niskayuna, who noted Thursday that retired teachers are already protected by a similar law. “Linking health insurance coverage for retirees and active workers is a fair approach,” Farley said in a statement responding to the veto, “and one which has been approved by three governors” — Mario Cuomo, George Pataki and Spitzer — when it comes to teachers.
   Pataki, however, also had vetoed bills similar to those Spitzer vetoed Wednesday.
   In his veto message, Spitzer said that while “these bills seek to advance the laudable and important goal of insuring that retiree health care benefits do not become a unique target of budget cuts,” nonetheless “it would be unwise to impose on every public employer in the state” the mandates in the legislation.
   E.J. McMahon, director of the fiscally conservative Empire Center for New York State Policy, said the vetoes were significant because the bills would have prevented governments from dealing with “the huge looming cost of benefits for retirees.”
   Farley’s statement said he “will introduce a bill creating an expert task force, with instructions to deliver recommendations to the governor and the Legislature by next spring” as to how to proceed. Spitzer called for an executive branch study and report.
   “A study is good if it produces the recognition that something needs to be done other than freezing all benefits in place,” McMahon said.
   Spitzer also vetoed union-backed bills that would have restricted reassignment of public employees and expanded pension benefi ts for “peace and police officers” in the Department of Taxation and Finance. Measures that he signed included one to raise the state police mandatory retirement age from 57 to 60.
   Darcy Wells, spokeswoman for the Public Employees Federation, and Steve Madarasz, spokesman for the Civil Service Employees Association, both said they were disappointed with the vetoes of the retiree health benefi ts bills, but praised Spitzer for prior actions he has taken this year. Wells cited the governor signing a law to combat workplace violence that she said Pataki had vetoed. Madarasz referred to Spitzer’s executive order making it easier to unionize day care workers.
   McMahon said the day care action, which his organization opposed, had been a big win for the unions. But he praised Spitzer for his previous veto of a bill that would have made it harder for local police departments to discipline officers, as well as for this week’s vetoes.

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Farley’s statement said he “will introduce a bill creating an expert task force, with instructions to deliver recommendations to the governor and the Legislature by next spring” as to how to proceed. Spitzer called for an executive branch study and report.