As very little attention has been paid to the good Governor's legislation he filed when he rolled out his FY12 budget proposal in late January, I feel it is my duty to bring this union-busting outrage to the cyber-world so the misfits in Skinner's world can start planning their protests accordingly.
I will try to make this short for those lurkers with limited attention spans.
The problem? municipalities can no longer sustain health insurance premiums of public employees' cadillac plans. Cities and towns in the Commonwealth of MA are bleeding out.
The governor's solution? cut state local aid to municipalities in the FY12, and
then force public employee unions to drop their cadillac plans and join GIC (which is a group of private health insurance carriers who offer greatly reduced rates to municipalities -- fixed risk pool, up until Congress passed Obamacare the yearly premium increases were tracking at 3%, that has since skyrocketed to 12% for most plans under GIC, however this is still far lower than the 18%-26% increases that the cadillac plans are tracking).
The legislation filed by coupe deval:
MUNICIPAL HEALTH INSURANCE
SECTION 6. (a) Each municipality shall provide health insurance coverage to its subscribers either through the group insurance commission or through other means with benefits of comparable actuarial value to those provided by the group insurance commission.
(b) Notwithstanding chapter 32B of the General Laws or any other general or special law to the contrary, if a municipality’s health insurance benefits do not comply with subsection (a), the chief executive of the municipality shall give notice to its public employee committee, established or which shall be established under section 19 of said chapter 32B, of its intention to enter into negotiations to provide health insurance coverage to its subscribers and to enter into a written agreement within a period prescribed by regulations to provide such coverage.
(c) If no agreement is reached within the prescribed period, the municipality shall transfer its subscribers to the group insurance commission or provide health insurance coverage to its subscribers in a manner prescribed by regulations and which complies with subsection (a).
http://www.malegislature.gov/Bills/187/House/H00036Translation: You sit down at the table and negotiate (what exactly, I don't know as there are NO independent policies for municipalities that can offer the low premiums that GIC can). If the union does not agree to go to GIC, then guess what? they are going to GIC.
Statehouse news:
The State House rollout of the proposal served to set parameters on the debate scheduled to formally resume on Beacon Hill Tuesday when the Legislature hosts a hearing on Gov. Deval Patrick's proposal to achieve cost reductions by forcing unions and communities to negotiate immediately for savings or join the state's Group Insurance Commission.
The unions, representing teachers, firefighters, police and other employees, said there plan would save $120 million, the same figure being sought by Patrick and the MMA, without eroding collective bargaining rights.
The plan agrees to a 45-day window for expedited coalition bargaining, like the governor's bill, toward a benchmark for savings on health care premiums with higher co-pays, deductibles, or other changes. Those benchmarks have not yet been established, but the governor has proposed using the GIC as a threshold for cost.
If unions and management could not agree, an independent third-party could decide whether local employees must join one of the state's group health insurance plans or set the framework for a local plan to achieve similar savings.
http://66.105.150.70/cgi/as_web.exe?REV2011+D+2540825Unions response:
Union leaders said they hoped the altered process would be a one-time compromise, and unions and municipal managers would go back to bargaining health care under traditional coalition bargaining rules when the new contracts expire. The unions also called for labor representation on the state Group Insurance Commission to be increased to 50 percent of the governing board, giving them enhanced power at the state bargaining table.
Paul Toner, president of the Massachusetts Teachers Association, said aggressive efforts to limit GIC cost increases by the state have "negatively impacted many employees most in need of treatment." The state last week announced that GIC plan premiums would increase on average 2.4 percent, far below average increases at the municipal level.
Note: The state's announcement on GIC is misleading -- the individual plans under GIC are all over the place, with the most popular (Fallon Select) rising 12% alone.
Well misfits, the Governor's legislation is not a one time deal. Your heads are so far up his ass you can't see what he is doing -- which is good. I hope the other governors in our union are taking notes here. Unions will accept the shaft is the shaft is presented by a Governor with a (D) after their name.
This will pass. Collective bargaining rights for health insurance will be stripped away from unions by the far left MA legislation under the guise of the governor's creative writing that both sides will sit at the table, go through the motions, come to no agreement, then force the move to GIC.
See kids? it's all good when you mandate the entire script for the "collective bargaining" process.
