The greed of these public union hacks at the state house was made abundantly clear with this latest move on the supplemental budget bill by Mr. George Nee of the AFL-CIO. “Don’t touch my union’s benefits!” The League of Cities and Towns had lobbied for a 25 percent co-share – a figure that would have saved a collective $17.6 million if all municipal employees paid that rate, according to a league review in January. Mr. Nee said union leaders objected to a mandatory co-share because it would be “an intrusion into the collective-bargaining process.” “To have it mandated or essentially decided by the General Assembly is basically unacceptable to us,” he said. Well Mr. Nee, the taxpayers do object to continue footing of the entire bill for your people. The private sector has been doing co-shares for decades and it is now time for the public employee unions to step up and do the same. State law does trump contracts and it would affect all of them. By running to speaker Fox to remove the co-share from this bill shows the total contempt you have for the taxpayers of this state.
Mr. Nee also wants mandatory binding arbitration this year and expressed that it was his “number one priority.” This would hinder any attempt to reduce the give-away deals that are present in many of these state and municipal collective bargaining agreements. Binding arbitration and perpetual collective bargaining agreements are bad legislation and puts the municipality at a disadvantage at the bargaining table and places an unfair tax burden on the property owners. These union groups have had it their way for decades but now they must be stopped to save the state from a pending receivership. The RI AFL-CIO leadership only cares about the public unions and not the welfare of the taxpayers of this state. Their constant dominance and lobbying at the state house has hurt every taxpayer of this state.
With this state being in the deplorable economic condition, perhaps the taxpayers should start calling for Rhode Island to be a right-to-work state and have “open shops.” The public unions are abusing the “privilege” they were given back in 1966 with the passage of “The Michelson Act.” Perhaps that law needs to be revisited and repealed as well. The taxpayers can and should push for that legislation to counter what big labor is doing to them right now; make it their “number one priority.” If this legislature is unwilling to listen to the taxpayers and allow themselves to be intimidated by these union hacks and their threats of withdrawing support for their re-election, then they will discover the voters will have the final say in the matter come November. Rhode Island is finally waking up to these unions and their underhanded tactics. The corruption is spreading in the municipalities and the unions do nothing to stop it; they pander to this behavior. Enough is enough – a change is needed now!
L.Chappell
Saunderstown, RI
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