Labor
A bill will come before the Rhode Island Senate Health and Human Services Committee today, S0483, that would if passed alter the mandate of the “Uniform Public School Employees’ Health Care Benefits Program Committee” (aka the “Teachers’ Health Insurance Board“). This board was created by the legislature two sessions ago over a veto by Governor…
The legislation has so little chance of coming anywhere close to enactment that proposing it is mainly theatrics, but it’s definitely a show worth performing, if only to remind people that the process exists to make it happen: [The bill by Rep. Joe Trillo (R, Warwick)] would rewrite the rulebook on negotiations with public-employee unions,…
A second bill to be heard by the Labor committee tomorrow (H5700, h/t Mike Puyana) looks like an attempt to create binding arbitration for municipal employees who are not police officers, firefighters or teachers. There is a scattering changes made by this bill, but I believe this strikeout is the key one…28-9.4-13. Appeal from decision.…
A bill (H5701) which would expressly give union contracts higher authority than local ordinances and city and town charters will be heard tomorrow by the House labor committee (h/t Mike Puyana)…Notwithstanding any provision of law to the contrary, in the event of any conflict between the terms of a collective bargaining agreement between a public…
Justin’s post from yesterday mentioned that Providence Mayor Angel Tavares’ decision to send dismissal notices to all current Providence teachers relates directly to the cost of substitutes. According to data available from the Rhode Island Department of Education website, Mayor Tavares has picked a reasonable area for reform, as the per-pupil costs of substitute teachers…
I guess I’m not as up on the workings of the State Labor Board as I should be. I was unaware that the State Labor Board could “issue a complaint” against someone, then hold a hearing to determine if that same complaint was valid in the first place. The state Labor Relations Board has issued…
The specifics could be adjusted elsewhere, but the general attitude that Julia Steiny describes at Blackstone Valley Preparatory Charter School, although there’s no revolutionary “paradigm change,” as the education academics like to contrive, seems like a profound shift. Note, especially, the handling of the teaching professionals: … at Blackstone Valley the two-teacher classroom [with more…
Anchor Rising readers are already familiar with the explanation of the problem basic problem with public-sector unions in a democracy that Andrew Klavan offers in the following video, but it’s worth a watch nonetheless: This article describing why Providence Mayor Angel Tavares had to give teachers termination notices, rather than layoff notices, provides excellent evidence…
Now that it’s official, here’s what they did in Wisconsin regarding public employee unions. 1) “…the bill meant that the state wouldn’t have to lay off public employees.” 2) “…[took] away the ability of unions to bargain over pensions and health care.” Just like the Federal Government employees. This was an attempt to gain flexibility…
Another interesting fact emerges when comparing Governor Carcieri’s last five-year forecast with Governor Chafee’s first. This table shows the degree of change that the former has made from the latter forecast: 2012 2013 2014 2015 Personnel expense -$16.8 M -$12.3 M -$27.9 M -$45.5 M State operations (including personnel) -$43.7 M -$38.4 M -$53.6 M…