Massachusetts
House Seeks to Limit Collective Bargaining
Published: April 29, 2011 - New York Times
BOSTON — Union leaders in this traditionally labor-friendly state are fuming
over a plan passed by the Massachusetts House of Representatives this week to
curtail bargaining rights for municipal workers, a highly unusual move by
Democratic lawmakers.
The bill, passed late Tuesday night in advance of planned labor protests,
would let local officials unilaterally set health
insurance co-payments and deductibles for their employees after a monthlong
discussion period with unions. Leaders of the House said it would save cities
and towns $100 million in the budget year that starts in July.
While Republican-controlled legislatures in Wisconsin and Ohio this year have
weakened the ability of public-sector unions to bargain collectively, and
Republicans in other states have pushed for a variety of curbs on unions,
Massachusetts is the first state where a Democratic-led chamber has voted to
limit bargaining rights.
“Everybody’s pretty upset,” said Robert J. Haynes, president of the
Massachusetts A.F.L.-C.I.O.
“It’s hard for me to understand how my good friends in the Massachusetts House,
that have told me they support collective bargaining, could do this.”
But the bill faces uncertain prospects in the Senate, which is also
controlled by Democrats. Senate President Therese Murray said Wednesday that she
was pleased the House had “moved the needle” on the contentious issue of health
care costs, but she has not endorsed the plan.
Dave Falcone, a Senate spokesman, said Friday that Ms. Murray “has been
consistent in her message that something has to be done, that there has to be
savings, and that everyone should have a seat at the table.”
While Gov. Deval
Patrick, a Democrat, has not pledged to sign the bill if it reaches his
desk, he proposed a similar plan early this year and praised the House this week
for its “important” vote. He also raised concerns about a provision of the House
plan allowing towns and cities to opt out of it and said unions must not have
veto power over municipal health plans.
On Friday, Mr. Patrick said through a spokesman that labor must have “a
meaningful role” in determining how to control health care costs, though he did
not elaborate.
The House
voted 111-42 in favor of the plan, with 81 Democrats approving it.
Representative Brian Dempsey, the Democratic chairman of the House Ways and
Means Committee, said he supported it — and in fact helped create it — after
seeing no other way of avoiding disastrous cuts to local public safety and
education budgets. The legislature had urged municipalities and their unions to
curb rising health costs for several years, he said, but with no success.
“We have to get a handle on this,” he said. “The fact of the matter is costs
are going up and the money is not going to the areas we desperately need it to.”
He acknowledged, though, that it was “certainly difficult” to hear labor’s
angry response.
Michael J. Widmer, president of the Massachusetts Taxpayers Foundation, a
nonpartisan watchdog group that supported the plan, said the health care costs
for cities and towns had been growing by about 11 percent a year and
“cannibalizing” local budgets.
“Yes, it’s a small curtailment of their collective bargaining powers,” Mr.
Widmer said of municipal unions, “but with the corollary that it will save lots
of their members’ jobs.”
Under the House plan, co-payments and deductibles for municipal workers would
have to be at least equal to those of state employees. And unions would retain
the right to negotiate what portion of premiums their members paid.
Mr. Patrick and House leaders have sought to head off comparisons with the
legislation that Gov. Scott
Walker of Wisconsin signed earlier this year, saying the Massachusetts plan
does not go nearly as far. That did not stop the Republican
Party of Wisconsin from proclaiming Mr. Patrick “an ally” on Friday and
congratulating him on the bill. Mr. Patrick is to speak at a Democratic
Party dinner in Wisconsin on Saturday.
“It’s refreshing to see that even a liberal Democrat from Massachusetts
recognizes the importance of collective bargaining reform,” Mark Jefferson, the
Wisconsin Republican Party’s executive director, said in a statement.