Dear CWA Member,

Despite some newspaper stories to the contrary – we did not get defeated in the Legislature.

Here's what happened -

A few months ago, a small group of State Senators led by Steve Sweeney and Barbara Buono put forward a dozen bills to cut our benefits, including proposals to cut pension benefits by 9%, to put all new workers into 401K plans, to change the formula used to compute the pension from the average of the final 3 years to the average of the final 5 years, and to eliminate anyone not working 35 hours a week from healthcare and pension benefits. 

We launched a huge fight with our allies in AFSCME, IFPTE, AFT and the NJEA which included not only membership mobilization and an intensive lobbying effort, but an extensive media campaign which brought pressure on the Legislature.

We beat back:

1. All layoffs;
2. 9% cut in pension;
3. New workers will not go into 401Ks;
4. We keep 3 years final average salary;
5. Part-timers keep pension and healthcare (where they have it);

But our enemies are powerful (Sweeney is the Senate Majority Leader and Barbara Buono is Chair of the Senate Budget Committee) and held the budget hostage.  They extracted 3 concessions as a price of their vote for the Governor's budget:

• A bill changing the Normal Retirement Age for new workers from 60 to 62;
• At the end of our contract – ALL local government and state government workers lose the Lincoln's Birthday holiday by statute.
• New part timers will have to earn $7500 a year to be in the pension plan instead of $1500.  (All of our part-timers meet this requirement.)

On June 23rd, these pension bills passed the State Senate by 31-8 in the State Senate and by a vote of 52-13 with 14 abstentions in the Assembly.  In the Assembly that means that nearly half of the Democrats refused to support this attack on our collectively bargained benefits.

Do not be discouraged.  We protected our members and we have a Fight Back plan!

1. We demand that Governor Corzine veto the bills that violate the contract.  Call Corzine today at 609-292-6000 and tell him:  "Keep Your Word!  Honor the Contract! Veto the Pension Bill!"
2. If he does not, we are filing a grievance.  We will seek to enforce the contract.
3. We are putting together a "Reward our Friends – Punish Our Enemies" plan for the 2009 election and beyond.

Bottomline – We fought hard and beat back the worst.  Many legislators are very angry at Sweeney and Buono for holding the budget hostage over increasing the retirement age of people 25 years from now and over trying to drive legitimate part-timers out of the pension and health care systems. We too will remember this and reward our friends and punish our enemies.

We don't always win everything – but we do always fight! Thank you to every member who wrote or called their Legislator or came to Lobby Days or rallied to protect our contract. Your participation in mobilization, as always, made a HUGE difference in the outcome of this struggle.

In solidarity,

Chris Shelton
Vice President, CWA District One