For the 2010 West Virginia Legislative Session the West Virginia Public Workers Union worked to educate our legislators to our issues. Our union members met with legislators, wrote letters and email and called to get these issues resolved. We were successful in getting sponsors on 5 bills that were introduced in the House of Delegates and one of those bills was also introduced in the Senate.
March 7 UPDATE The Charleston Gazette reported Sunday March 7 that the House Committee on Government Organization met on Friday March 5 and adopted a resolution to study WV OSHA for public employees. That article is here -
www.wvgazette.com/news/201003060445 A similar WV OSHA study resolution was adopted by the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday, March 4. That study resolution is
SCR 51 Requesting the Joint Committee on Government and Finance to authorize a study of the state Occupational, Safety and Health Act. Several more articles on WV OSHA are listed below on this website.
Also on Thursday the Senate Judiciary Committee adopted
SCR 53 Requesting the Joint Committee on Government and Finance to authorize a study of state employee interdepartmental transfers (involuntary transfer).
In the final days of the 2010 legislative session ask your legislators to study the seniority rights of public employees, ask the Finance Committees to grant a reasonable cost of living adjustment for all public employees and retirees and ask your legislator to curtail the PEIA Finance Board from continuing to cut benefits and raise out of pocket costs for worker's who continue to be denied meaningful raises through a questionable administrative directive.
Public Workers Legislative Package As the legislative session started we delivered a petition with over 1,700 signatures asking the Legislature and the Governor for a modest $1,000 Cost of Living Adjustment. Our COLA bill was introduced as
House Bill 4317. This bill provided for the implementation of a COLA for all public employees and retirees retroactive to July 1, 2009, based on the state budget surplus that public employees earned due to the statewide staffing shortage.
House Bill 4331 is the Public Workers Union bill that would have provided public employees with enhanced seniority rights based on the existing seniority rights for certain public employees. This bill would have required the recognition of employee seniority in the hiring, promotion, transfer and layoffs of public workers. Recognizing our seniority rights would eliminate a majority of the favoritism in hiring grievances over night. Recognizing seniority is a cost saving measure which would cost nothing to the tax payers while saving the state tens of thousands of dollars each year. Employee productivity would increase, job satisfaction would increase, favoritism in hiring would be nearly eliminated and the reduction in
grievance costs alone would be significant.
House Bill 4419 and the companion
Senate Bill 650 is the Public Workers Union bill that would require the development of meaningful caseload standards for the Department of Health and Human Resource program areas. This concept of caseload standards in the DHHR program areas has been in the law since the 1990's but has never been implemented or enforced. Caseload standards are necessary in order for public workers to provide the level of services our communities need and to protect the workers health and safety.
House Bill HB 4567 is the Public Workers Union bill to repeal the authority to involuntarily transfer employees. This authority is punitive and requires no compliance with the reduction in force laws that protect employees from abusive management practices.
House Bill 4645 is the Public Workers Union bill that would have required the Division of Labor to implement occupational, safety and health standards in the public offices and work places where our employees serve our communities. Requiring WV OSHA enforcement and compliance will protect both the employees and the client public’s health in all of our public offices statewide. According to a 2002 Legislative Audit, the state Division of Labor has been negligent implementing and enforcing WV OSHA for public workers since its inception in 1987. The cost of failing to address this problem is skyrocketing. Lost productivity time, increased employee health care costs, increased maintenance costs for failing to properly address this problem up front, and the endangerment of employees and the communities we serve is inexcusable.
WV OSHA appeared in the Charleston Gazette, Sunday, February 28. A link to that news article is here -
http://www.wvgazette.com/News/201002270552Charleston Gazette reporter Paul Nyden has covered these OSHA concerns in another interesting article that was published Sunday, February 21 - a link to that news article is here -
http://www.wvgazette.com/News/201002200443Other Bills supported by the Public Workers Union House Bill 4210 requires the PEIA Finance Board to have a quorum of board members at each public hearing that is required to be conducted by the board. While the Public Workers Union believes that the law is clear that the PEIA Finance Board was always required to have a majority of its members present at the public hearings, the agency interpretation of the current law makes this bill necessary. This bill passed out of the House of Delegates and is currently pending in the Senate Committee on Government Organization.
House Bill 2571 would require a cost benefit analysis of all privatization contracts of public services. Although a cost benefit analysis of the privatization of public services is currently expected to be conducted by law, the failure of meaningful oversight of the privatization plans of the executive branch of government makes this bill necessary.
Bills Opposed by the West Virginia Public Workers Union Senate Bill 73 and the authorization bills for the corresponding legislative rule in
Senate Bill 313 and House Bill 4059 would have changed the number of hours that a temporary employee is required to work before being covered by the civil service system from 720 hours in 12 months to 1,000 hours in 12 months. Both the Senate and House Committees on Government Organization amended
Senate Bill 313 and House Bill 4059 on temporary employee status from 1,000 hours to go back to 720 hours in 12 months.
Thank you to all of the members of the Public Workers Union for meeting with your legislators, and for your letters, emails, and phone calls to your legislators, because
Senate Bill 73 died in the Senate Committee on Government Organization.
ACTION ALERT - Help the WV Public Workers TodayOn Wednesday, March 3, the Senate voted 33-1 to pass
Senate Bill 467. SB 467 permits the Division of Personnel to implement reclassification plans without following the law for adopting new classification or reclassification plans. Current law requires public comment periods and an approval process which SB 467 circumvents.
Senate Bill 467 provides no legislative oversight which gives the Division of Personnel a blank check to prevent the right of public workers to appeal the implementation of any future reclassification plans. Not only does this bill authorize a blanket exemption to the Division of Personnel to implement an undefined reclassification plan for all of state government, this bill denies the due process rights of public workers by prohibiting grievances regarding the implementation of all such unwritten and undefined classification and reclassification plans.
Please contact your elected representatives in the House of Delegates and urge them to kill
Senate Bill 467. You can find your Delegates and Senators on the WV Legislatures website:
www.legis.state.wv.usPublic Workers Presidents Day Rally in the NewsPublic workers rallying at the state capitol were covered in several news stories, including a print article by the Associate Press which was printed in the Charleston Gazette - here -
http://www.wvgazette.com/ap/ApTopStories/201002150320An electronic media story on WCHS TV - here -
http://www.wchstv.com/newsroom/eyewitness/100215_1080.shtmlWest Virginia public workers rally covered in the national news magazine In These Times - here -
http://inthesetimes.com/working/entry/5568/around_the_country_state_employees_rally_against_furloughs_pay_cuts/
“Feeling harassed? Discriminated against? Are you unfairly paid? Is your workplace unsafe? This is a wake-up call.