Dear Sisters and Brothers:
With the onset of the Holiday Season, allow me to update you on a few items of interest.
Holiday Party
The local will be holding it’s annual holiday party on December 12th at Moretti’s on West Jackson. The deadline for RSVP is December 4, 2008. You can bring one guest and law clerks are welcome. One catch: you must RSVP by email to unionparty08@gmail.com. You must identify not only yourself but your guest as well. Please respect the process and send the email. This is the only way the local can know how many people to have food and drink for.
Negotiations
Since September, local board members have been participating in bargaining with the County in order to obtain a new collective bargaining agreement for Local 3315. As in past years, the County and AFSCME have been unable to negotiate a new contract before the current one expired. While the contract has a self renewal clause, but for that provision, it expired on November 30th, 2008. The issues currently on the table are non-economic and concern such things as the use of personal days and military leave. Many other non-ecomomic issues are currently on both the universal table and local table.
The County will only engage in a discussion of economic issues (i.e. wages and health care) once the non-economic issues have been resolved. Forthcoming is the usual report from some consulting firm the County hires (at conderable expense) to describe the health plan we currently enjoy and how the County just can’t afford such benefits. The process, at this time, is painfully slow and we anticipate the necessity for job actions to pressure the County in moving the negotiations along. Stay tuned and please cooperate with job actions requested by your executive board.
The 1% Issue
The arbitration concerning the 1%issue will be held on December 12th, 2008. As soon as there is a decision from the arbitrator, we will inform the membership. ( The decision will probably not be available till the early months of 2009.)
Union Dues
As of January 1, 2009, your dues will increase 69 cents per pay period. The increase was mandated by the International and while we regret an increase, it insures that the local maintains the level of services and benefits offered to our members.
ARDC Dues
Please don’t forget to pay your ARDC dues because our contract requires that all assistants be “listed on the Master Roll of attorneys licensed to practice in the State of Illinois and shall remain so listed during the term of employment.” Management is verifying compliance online so please comply promptly. Incidentally, we are proposing, in local negotiations, that the County pay our dues in the next contract.
Happy Holidays!
K. S. Galhotra
President, Local 3315