“We need to bring our state back.
Wisconsin needs a governor who is focused on jobs, not ideology;
a leader committed to bringing our state together and healing political wounds,
not pitting people against each other and catering to the special interests.
This is the governor I will be for the people of Wisconsin.”
—Tom Barrett

A time for unity:
AFT-Wisconsin endorses Tom Barrett for governor

Dear AFT-Wisconsin Member,

Last night, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett won the Democratic primary and became the candidate who will challenge Gov. Scott Walker on June 5. AFT-Wisconsin wholeheartedly endorses Tom Barrett.

AFT-W had supported staunch labor ally Kathleen Falk. But as Kathleen said last night, now is the time for labor—and everyone who wants to bring back the Wisconsin we love—to unite behind Tom Barrett.

Here’s who Tom Barrett is: A proven friend of labor, who has pledged to restore our bargaining rights. A champion of public employees and education, who’s vowed to restore the education funding slashed by Gov. Walker, and protect the quality and affordability of our technical college and university system. A voice for Wisconsin on Capitol Hill, with a 100% AFT voting record in his 10 years in Congress. A mayor who created the good jobs Wisconsin needs. A candidate who can defeat Scott Walker and heal the wounds this governor has inflicted on our state.

Tom has deep Wisconsin roots. The son of a World War II veteran who was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross for 30 missions over Germany, Tom was raised in Milwaukee’s west side, where he and his family still live. He graduated from UW-Madison college and law school, working in-between on the Harley-Davidson assembly line. After serving in the state assembly and state senate, Tom represented Wisconsin’s 5th district in Congress from 1993-2003. He was elected mayor of Milwaukee in 2004.

As mayor, Tom has created jobs. He co-founded the M7, an economic development group that brought hundreds of jobs to our state. He helped Helios USA and Ingeteam create good jobs for Milwaukee families, and helped bring thousands of new jobs to the Menomonee Valley.

Tom will restore our rights: “…to me the most important goal is making sure that working people in this state have the right to collectively bargain and to collectively organize," he told Madison’s WMTV-News. Tom has cried shame on the “ideological civil war” Gov. Walker has waged in Wisconsin.

Tom needs our help to win. Polling shows this race at a virtual dead heat. Your vote and your help are crucial. What we do between now and June 5 will make the difference. We need to get out there and knock on doors. We need to make phone calls. We need to ask our friends, neighbors, and families to vote for Tom Barrett on June 5.

We’ve come so far since Act 10. Let’s finish the job. Our unity has brought us to this election. If we unite once again to support Tom Barrett, we will take back our state on June 5.

In solidarity,

Bryan Kennedy
President
AFT-Wisconsin

Another shocker from Governor Walker: AFT-Wisconsin statement on the new WERC rules on base wages

On Friday, March 30, Governor Walker approved revised emergency administrative rules for determining base wages for bargaining under Act 10. Under these new rules, base wages will no longer be equivalent to an individual’s actual salary, but rather a lesser amount that excludes compensation for educational attainment, credentialing, lump sum merit, and overtime, among other items. While this change applies to state and municipal employees, it will likely affect our K-12 and tech college teacher locals disproportionately, as many of our teacher union contracts include educational attainment salary bumps.

These new rules are a departure from the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission’s original interpretation of how base salary should be calculated. The original emergency rules, which were unanimously approved by the Commission, defined base wages much more broadly. At Walker’s request, the Commission redrafted the rules to further limit unions’ ability to negotiate on their members’ behalf. These new rules were approved by the Commission along partisan lines. James Scott and Rodney Pasch, the two Walker appointees, voted in favor of the new rules, while Judy Neumann, the remaining Doyle appointee on the Commission, dissented. For a copy of the new rules, go here: http://werc.wi.gov/selected_press_releases_and_werc_world_articles.htm#maximum_base_wage_increase_rules_redrafted.

The revised rules set the base wage and, therefore, the CPI increase, substantially below the amount needed to pay teachers their current salaries. For instance, if the union contract has a base salary for a starting teacher with a BA of $38,000, but a starting salary for a teacher with an MA is $50,000, the bargained salary increase up to CPI will be figured on the teacher’s base salary of $38,000 rather than her actual salary of $50,000. WERC General Counsel Peter Davis reports that any increase beyond this amount—and, in fact, any part of the teacher’s current salary that is attributed to educational attainment or other “supplemental compensation”—will not be bargainable under the new rules.

These new administrative rules are another example of Governor Walker’s overreach and his willingness to use the political process to bust our unions and undermine public education and state services. Under the new rules for municipal employees, general employees are divided into essentially two classes—teachers and other general employees whose salary increases have not been linked to educational attainment. As a result, the rules seem to discriminate against teachers: there is no rational basis for treating teachers' salaries differently than other general municipal employees. Further, the new rules may have the consequence of reducing teachers’ take-home pay. The union is looking into both these matters.

The news is dire, but it does not necessarily mean that teachers will see a pay cut. Nothing in the rules requires districts to cut teacher pay. Districts still have the ability to seek input from the union on supplemental salary plans, and they still have the ability to include salary increases for educational attainment in policy or handbooks. There is strong incentive for districts to continue the educational attainment increase. Students benefit from having teachers who have continued their own education. Our union locals should be working with their administrations and boards and with the larger community to ensure that educational attainment and other supplemental increases are preserved in the handbook and/or in board policy.

These rules are yet another reason in a long list for recalling Governor Walker and his Republican cronies in the legislature. This is not only a matter of union rights. It is a matter of protecting and preserving Wisconsin’s public education. To participate in the recall election process, email Jessica Ulstad at ulstad@aft-wisconsin.org.

To hear what AFT-W Attorney Tim Hawks has to say about Walker's new rule on base wages for teachers, click here.

If you have questions about the new administrative rules, please contact your AFT-W staff rep. You may also contact the AFT-Wisconsin office directly at 608-662-1444.

AFT-Wisconsin response to Judge Conley's Circuit Court ruling

Madison, WI – On March 30, U.S. District Judge William Conley struck down two important provisions in 2011 Wisconsin Act 10, Governor Walker’s “budget repair bill” that stripped public employees of their collective bargaining rights. Responding to a lawsuit filed last year by AFT-Wisconsin and six other public sector unions, the Court found that there was no “rational basis” either for the provision that unions must re-certify annually with an absolute majority or for the prohibition against collecting union dues via payroll deduction. The Court found unequivocally that these provisions of Act 10 violated the Constitutional requirements of equal protection and free speech.

The findings of this lawsuit represent a step toward justice. The Court’s decision proves once again that Scott Walker’s attack on public workers was not about balancing the budget. By describing these provisions of Act 10 as unreasonable and irrational, the ruling highlights that Governor Walker and his administration committed an outrageous over-reach of power and acted in a politically-motivated manner to punish the working people of Wisconsin and the unions that they belong to.

However, this court ruling is only a first step, and the fight must continue. The stakes for winning the upcoming recall elections have never been higher. AFT-W President Bryan Kennedy points out that “this court decision provides yet another reason to support the recalls against the Governor, the Lieutenant Governor, and the State Senators who supported this egregious legislation. It is imperative, now more than ever, that we elect leaders who will fight for working families and not just for corporations and the wealthy. Further, AFT-Wisconsin and organized labor must – and will – continue to fight for workers so that our rights to negotiate for fair wages and safe working conditions and to have a meaningful voice in the workplace are restored.”

One year later: AFT-W members
join thousands at capitol protest
on anniversary of Act 10

A year after the state legislature passed Gov. Walker’s union-busting Act 10, tens of thousands of Wisconsinites—including hundreds of AFT-W members—turned out for a “Reclaim Wisconsin” march and rally at the capitol. Once again, Solidarity signs waved high around the "Forward" statue and chants rang through Capitol Square, as Wisconsinites showed up in force to tell Gov. Walker and the state legislators who rammed through Act 10 that their betrayal of working families last March is not forgotten.

“We're baaaack!" Wisconsin AFL-CIO  president Phil Neuenfeldt, told a cheering crowd that some estimates put as high as 60,000. Neuenfeldt and other speakers urged rally participants to redouble their efforts for the upcoming recall elections, likely to take place in early June. Facing recall from an outraged electorate are Gov. Walker, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, and four anti-working-family state senators, including Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald. With the state elections board having just ruled that recall elections for the four state senators will indeed go forward alongside the gubernatorial recall [http://www.postcrescent.com/article/20120313/APC010405/203130443/Government-Accountability-Board-orders-recalls-against-four-Wisconsin-state-senators], hopes are running high for better leadership in Madison in the months to come. “I sense change in the air and I’m not talking spring,” State Senator Jen Shilling  (D- 32nd District) told the protesters. Shilling trounced pro-Walker state senator Dan Kapanke in a recall election last August.

For more on the rally, click here: http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/elections/unions-rally-against-walker-bargaining-law/article_41d9713a-6aeb-11e1-be5b-001871e3ce6c.html.