April 18, 2013
By Marc Bussanich
Brooklyn, NY—Deputy Mayor Cas Holloway spoke before the Citizens Budget Commission yesterday and charted a plan to resolve all outstanding public sector labor contracts. The City’s public sector unionized workforce have been working without new contracts for five years, but organized labor will have to agree to health care contributions from active members and retirees and no retroactive pay increases. Watch Video
In a statement, Mr. Holloway said that the City is eager to enter into negotiations with organized labor.
“The City is prepared to agree to a new contract with any union that agrees to no retroactive, recession-era pay increases—which we cannot afford—and to meaningful healthcare benefit reform that improves the quality of care and reduces costs.”
One component of the proposed healthcare reform includes rewarding employees for “living healthy and assisting the City to reduce overall healthcare costs through disease management, data analysis and other best practices,” which the City claims will save $400 million annually.
Public Advocate and 2014 mayoral hopeful Bill de Blasio, after speaking to fired building service workers at the Arias Park Slope luxury apartment building yesterday evening, told Labor Press that the City shouldn’t be negotiating in public.
“I found it ironic and hypocritical to go years without addressing the issue to suddenly announce publicly their negotiating terms. You don’t negotiate in public. This should have happened in many cases years ago,” said de Blasio.
City Comptroller John Liu also addressed fired building service workers Wednesday evening in Park Slope. In a statement, he said, “Today’s proposal sends a clear message: the Bloomberg Administration refuses to deal with the multi-billion dollar labor mess of its own making and will continue to ‘kick the can down the road' approach for the next eight months. The Mayor has chosen to blame City employees for rising health-care costs and ignore his own failure to secure a good health-care deal for the City.”
Follow Marc Bussanich on Twitter marc@laborpress.org
