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Category: CPPW
Bargaining Event – May 21
- Want serious raises in 2025?
- Want more fair remote work scheduling and in office exceptions?
- Ready to have cash out options for your vacation leave?
- Think we should evolve Management Leave into a fair & equitable Earned Leave policy?
Then, it’s time to show the City that you are ready to do something about it!
The CPPW Contract Action Team is calling out all CPPW members to come join us and highlight our priorities and our collective power to the City!
Tuesday, May 21
CPPW will be providing lunch
Noon – 1pm (Note: New Time!)
Portland Building Room 217 for lunch, Room 216 for Bargaining
RSVP now to let us know you’ll come
or that you can’t be there in person but want the digital swag to support remotely.
Healthcare FY2024-25
Update about the changes to healthcare costs in FY2024-25. The $25 per month surcharge to Moda and Kaiser standard plants is not ideal, unfortunately, this was the best option of two bad options for the biggest number of CPPW members.
Labor Management Benefits Committee (LMBC) worked on the benefits plan for how to absorb the double-digit increases for the self-insured (Moda) and Kaiser plans, 11.9 and 14.1 percent increases, respectively. The LMBC was unable to come to consensus on a path forward leaving. The City proposed making adjustments to control their own costs by shifting more of the costs on to members through increased costs, increased deductibles, larger copays, and much higher out of pocket maximums.
Labor rallied together to mitigate costs to members and changes to healthcare coverage.
CPPW presented information about this healthcare change during the April 2024 general membership meeting. The City required all labor unions to sign on to the FY2024-25 surcharge in order to avoid potentially much larger and certainly more ambiguous changes to the healthcare coverage for City employees. CPPW leadership put the proposal for a $25 a month healthcare surcharge to a vote of the general membership at the April 2024 general membership meeting. General membership voted to approve signing the letter agreeing to the surcharge.
Next Steps
The LMBC will convene beginning in May 2024 to work to understand healthcare cost increases, mitigate costs while maintaining high quality, accessible, comprehensive healthcare coverage for members. Beginning this process now means we will have more time to develop strategies for addressing the healthcare cost crisis.
Contract Action Team
The Contract Action Team is a group of members that take action in the workplace to support bargaining.
Contract Action Team is open for members – we want at least one team member in every bureau!
What you’ll do:
- Get early information and insider scoop on bargaining issues;
- Check in with your coworkers & let people know that you are a point of contact for the union;
- Host in-person or virtual office hours where coworkers can stop by and ask questions, get swag, sign a card (Donut lunch or Break Room Coffee Chat or Virtual Open House to talk about particular bargaining issues). You’ll always have support from another CAT member or a bargaining team member!;
- Help get content (pics, etc) for social media;
- Help coordinate actions – hand out buttons, share virtual background with colleagues, ask people to take bargaining surveys.
Why this is important:
- The only way – only way! – to win a strong contract is to have an active and engaged membership. You would be a part of engaging people to stay informed and take action on issues that matter to our careers, our families, and our future.
- The Bargaining Team needs support. It’s a big job to bargain the contract, we need other folks who are in all parts of the City to help communicate about what the team is doing and give feedback on crucial contract issues.
- This is a way to participate in the union that is fun, social, and time limited. You don’t need a ton of time to be a great CAT member!
Interested?
Email [email protected] or [email protected]
Bargaining 101
How this process works in 6 simple steps
- Team Building: Build a Bargaining Team! CPPW members elected a 9 member (+ 1 alternate) bargaining team from around the City to represent the whole membership at the table. See your bargaining team here. Then, hire a lawyer to support the bargaining team during negotiations – CPPW’s lawyer is Katelyn Oldham. Done and done!
- Scheduling and Agreements: Set ground rules with the City and schedule bargaining meetings – this happened on January 24th.
- Negotiations & Action: Each side exchange proposals and caucuses to negotiate at meetings – this will happen during meetings scheduled between March – July 2024. Union members are encouraged to participate in this process by attending bargaining sessions, offering testimony of your experiences, taking bargaining surveys to prioritize issues, and taking action to show the City how committed we are to winning a strong contract. The #1 way to get a strong contract is to have powerful action by the members during negotiations.
- Assess: The initial bargaining period is legally a minimum of 150 days, after that we see where we are at and what needs to happen. If needed, both sides can agree to continue bargaining or the process can go to mediation.
- TA: Tentative agreement is reached. The City send the tentative agreement to City Council for approval and CPPW sends it to our membership for a vote (you must be card signed member to vote!)
- Ratification Vote: When the the majority of membership (and City Council) vote to approve the tentative agreement – our first contract is ratified!