TRENTON — The state’s largest employee union blasted a deal brokered between Gov. Chris Christie and Senate President Stephen Sweeney that would increase employee health and pension costs. Communications Workers of America, which represents about 40,000 state employees, is currently in contract negotiations with Christie, but the two parties have made little progress in the area of health benefits....
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Senate President Stephen Sweeney, right, and Gov. Chris Christie brokered a deal that would increase employee health and benefits costs. TRENTON — The state’s largest employee union blasted a deal brokered between Gov. Chris Christie and Senate President Stephen Sweeney that would increase employee health and pension costs.
Communications Workers of America, which represents about 40,000 state employees, is currently in contract negotiations with Christie, but the two parties have made little progress in the area of health benefits.
Christie has repeatedly maintained that he wants to legislate health benefits, and he moved a step closer after reportedly reaching an agreement with Sweeney (D-Gloucester). It’s unclear whether the Assembly, led by Speaker Shelia Oliver (D-Essex), will follow.
Bob Master, CWA legislative and political director, called the deal an “outrageous attack on the collective bargaining rights of New Jersey's public workers and their standard of living.”
“Nowhere else in the country have Democrats turned their backs on working people,” Master said. “Senator Steve Sweeney and the other so-called Democrats supporting his legislation have joined a senseless right-wing attack on the middle class for the sake of political expediency."
The heads of local and state unions were briefed this morning in Trenton on the details of the deal by a Sweeney staffer.
“It was soundly rejected,” said Dominick Marino, head of the state’s International Association of Firefighters.
Under the deal, most public workers would immediately pay an additional 1 percent of their salaries for their pensions, while police and firefighters would pay an additional 1.5 percent. The state would pledge to increase its pension contributions to legally required levels.
Sweeney and Christie also agreed to establish a pension board for each fund that would help set future contribution levels, but their powers would be limited until the respective funds have at least 80 percent of the assets needed to make future obligations.
Currently, the state has about 66 percent of the assets needed to meet future obligations, ranking it among the most poorly-funded public pension plans in the nation.
Workers would pay up to 30 percent of their health care premiums after a four-year period. But unlike Gov. Chris Christie’s original proposal, the payments would be tiered based on income, so employees with lower salaries pay less.
