SEIU Local 509 Members Take Action & Win First Quality Care Fund!

Last week, the Massachusetts Legislature passed and The Governor signed a Supplemental Budget, which included the creation of the Quality Care Fund.

The Quality Care Fund has been a legislative priority for Local 509 for the last few years, and this budget will see our hard work pay off. This innovative program, which links increased job training to increased wages, will provide a fund of $1million for increased pay for human service workers, who get additional training. Although this wasn't as much money as we wanted, it is a good start, which can be improved on in future years.

With this program in place, turnover would decrease, thus keeping the most experienced caregivers on the job and improving the quality of services in Massachusetts.

Hundreds of Local 509 Members, both state workers and private sector human workers, united to get this passed at the state house. Watch for more information about how your employer can apply for this money.

Support the Quality Care Fund

Pass the Supplemental Budget

Last week the Governor’s office released the details of a Supplemental Budget, and included in the bill are a number of great victories for human service workers in Massachusetts!

Thanks to the many of you who took action last week and told your legislators to support the Quality Care Fund in the supplemental budget!

However, in order to ensure that the budget passes with the Quality Care Fund in place, we need many more people to contact their representatives and senators and tell them how important this is to human service workers in Massachusetts.

The creation of the Quality Care Fund has been a legislative priority for Local 509 for the last few years, and this budget would see our hard work pay off in a big way for many of our members. This innovative program that links increased job training to increased wages would provide $3.8 million for private sector human service workers that complete job-related training.

With this program in place, turnover would decrease, thus keeping the most experienced caregivers on the job and improving the quality of services in Massachusetts

Very shortly, your legislators will start debating the bill, and we need to make it clear to them that this bill is an important step toward improving services for some of our Commonwealth's most vulnerable citizens.

Click here in order to contact your legislators and let them know that you support passing the budget.

Two Tales of the Private Sector Human Services Chapter

By Chapter President, Dennis MacDonald

“…it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the Spring of hope, it was the Winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us…”

These words from Charles Dickens’ A Tale Of Two Cities, written over 150 years ago, could just as easily have been written by any of our private sector field reps if they were to describe what contract bargaining has been like in 2011. Unlike 2008, when over 92% of the members amongst twenty agencies voted to go on strike, this year, we had thirty-one contracts to negotiate. Progress at many of the agencies is at a standstill; as we go to press, there will have been a dozen or more rallies and pickets aimed at trying to secure more money, better health care plans and other benefits for the lowest paid members of Local 509. At the most difficult negotiations, agencies have frozen step increases, i.e. no raises, and simultaneously tried to force their workers to accept health care plans with drastically higher co-pays and/or high deductibles. For some workers, health insurance will become completely unaffordable, forcing them to apply for Mass Health. Some agencies have offered bonuses instead of raises as a cost-cutting measure or, at best, halved their raises, from 1.5% to 0.75%. When a worker typically earns $11 per hour, that 0.75% totals a whopping $171.60 per year for full time employees. At some of these same agencies, members are expected to use their cars to drive hundreds of miles every month at a reimbursement rate twelve cents or more below the IRS rate; there is no car allowance.

Not all is doom and gloom in the private sector. On May 10, 2011, over 700 human services workers at Bridgewell, based in Lynn and the Merrimack Valley, overwhelmingly won their election to form a union. Back on December 16, 2010, over 500 workers from Sullivan & Associates (now Guidewire), based in Springfield, Pittsfield and Worcester, voted to form a union. We welcome our new Sisters and Brothers.

In the past two years, Local 509’s Organizing Department has been a bonfire of activity, also leading successful organizing campaigns for the Brien Center (the Berkshires), HEC/CES (statewide) and Delta Projects (mostly south central MA), increasing our ranks by close to 800 members. Once our Sisters and Brothers at Guidewire and Bridgewell ratify contracts, the private sector will have grown by over 2,000 members since 2009.

Eliot Contract Ratified!

On Friday, July 22, workers at Eliot voted to ratify a new contract with the agency!

Great work by all of the bargaining team members, stewards, and workplace leaders who worked hard to get to this point.

For more information about the new contract, contact your steward or field rep.

509 Members Rally at Eliot

On Friday, June 10, caregivers at Eliot rallied and picketed at five locations throughout eastern and central Massachusetts. Joined by politicians and community allies, we sent a strong message to management at Eliot that we're not going to back down in our fight for a fair and just contract.

Many thanks go out to the 509 members from other chapters and agencies who came together with their union brothers and sisters at Eliot.

Click here for more pictures. Stay tuned for press coverage from the rallies.

MSPCC Members Rally in Holyoke

Joined by community allies and other Local 509 members, employees at the Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children (MSPCC) rallied in front of the agency's Holyoke office to show management that they're not backing down in their fight for a new contract.

After weeks of negotiations, MSPCC continues to threaten our health insurance if we don't make productivity standards. "You have been held to productivity standards that are unattainable," said SEIU Local 509 President Susan Tousignant, addressing the rally. "Management has threatened to take away health insurance benefits by increasing co-pays and has created a toxic work environment."

Click here to send a message to MSPCC CEO Marylou Sudders telling her that you stand with MSPCC workers.

Rallies Across the State Kick-off Human Serivce Workers Campaign

Local 509 members advocate for safer working conditions and a living wage

In the last week hundreds of Local 509 members have braved the cold to join together in rallies across the state. With chants of "Hey hey, ho ho, unsafe staffing's got to go!" we brought the message to the public that while human service work is important to our communities, it is often not given the respect and dignity that it deserves. At each of the rallies, union members and allies from the community spoke of the often unsafe working conditions and inadequate pay that private-sector human service workers face in Massachusetts. A special thanks goes out to the numerous 509 public-sector members that attended and spoke in support of their union sisters and brothers in the private-sector.

The rallies kicked off with a mid-day gathering in front of the Malden Center MBTA station on Tuesday. Speakers from Massachusetts Advocates Standing Strong (MASS), the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), the Greater Boston Labor Council, and a number of other community allies joined our private and public sector members to support human service workers.

Wednesday's rally brought us to Lincoln Square in downtown Worcester at rush hour. As in Malden, there was tremendous turnout from SEIU Local 509 members and our community allies, including a strong contingent from MPower. Amidst numerous waves and car-horn honks of support, State Senator Michael Moore as well as represenatives from MASS and MPower, spoke passionately in support of the hard work that human service workers do for the people of our state.

Continuing west, Springfield was the next stop on our tour of the commonwealth. Along with the 509 private- and public-sector members who staged the rally, representatives from Western Mass Jobs With Justice and the UAW stood with us to support human service workers in the Pioneer Valley.

In addition to the many passers-by, our message was also spread throughout Western Massachusetts with news reports airing that night on WWLP-22 (click here to watch), CBS 3 Springfield (click here to watch), and WGGB-6, and a radio broadcast on WFCR.

Our rallies concluded with a trip to New Bedford on Friday. With support from the Greater Southeastern Massachusetts Labor Council and other community allies, our members made a strong showing in front of City Hall. In fact, after the rally a group of 509 members were invited inside to meet with Mayor Scott Lang as well as a group of the local State Representatives and State Senators to discuss the issues facing human service workers in their community. We would like to thank the mayor and the state delegation for taking the time to listen to our concerns.

With a week of successful rallies bringing attention to our cause, the private-sector members of Local 509 are now organizing for the upcoming contract campaigns at a number of our facilities. In order to make sure that human service workers are treated with dignity and respect, we're taking our fight for safe staffing and a living-wage to the State House and local legislators around the state.

To get involved, contact your steward.

CMHS Arbitration Award

Congratulations to our members at Comprehensive Mental Health Systems, Inc. on winning your arbitration award in regards to the declaration of state of emergency. 

 

The arbitrator agreed with us that CMHS violated the union contract, by not paying extra money to staff who work on days when a state of emergency has been declared.

 

We want to thank CMHS union leaders, Ms. Liz Bigelow and Ms. Millie Gonzalez for traveling to Boston to attend and testify at the American Arbitration Association offices.  Their testimony making crucial arguments on behalf of their co-workers played a major role in us winning.

 

“The best part for me was having the hearing on a Friday and receiving the decision and subsequent award on the following Monday.  I have to look at Labor history to see if it is unprecedented to receive a decision so quickly” said Field Rep Maurice Penn.  “Millie and Liz did a fabulous job!”

 

The total award is in excess of thirteen thousand dollars.