Normally, the summer mailing is written in the summer, but this year's warm season was too event-filled to allow that. This, then, is the belated summer News From OSA, covering news that occurred during our normal "slow" season.

The contract, the vaccine, the Medicare Advantage program -- all this and more has been happening and will be happening right through the fall.

THE CONTRACT... Our union's bargaining history has four examples of our main unit contract being delayed. In each case, the citywide "pattern" was involved. That "pattern" has been set during each contract bargaining period since the 1960's. The City decides what it can afford to pay and then negotiates with the largest union available at that time. Usually, for civilian unions, DC37 sets the pattern when it completes its negotiations and votes to accept the City's final offer.

The City always starts by offering less than the final settlement and no smaller civilian local seeks to bargain prior to completion of DC37's negotiation, nor would the City normally entertain such negotiation.

As soon as the pattern has been set, the rest of the civilian unions line up to bargain their own contracts.

Something similar happens with the uniformed forces and the Police Benevolent Association. The United Federation of Teachers has also, on occasion, set the pattern instead of DC37.

You might assume that, since the fiscal pattern was established before the smaller locals entered bargaining, that their negotiations would be a mere formality and quickly completed. This can actually happen and does so on rare occasion.

More commonly, the City seeks to reduce the value of the pattern for smaller locals and/or the smaller local seeks to increase the value of the pattern.

In 2001, the City refused to assure OSA that hundreds of newly unionized Administrative Staff Analysts and Supervising Systems Analysts would not be deprived of due, but not yet issued, Managerial Pay Plan raises. It was the City's intention to settle the OSA contract in May. Then, once it was approved by July of that year, the City would issue the managerial pay order that would specifically exempt the newly unionized employees from any managerial raise. Thus, hundreds of employees would get neither a managerial raise nor a union raise.

The union refused to settle our contract until a pay order was written in October of 2001 that did not penalize our new members because they had chosen to be unionized.

In 2003, a pattern was set that called for a 1% raise in return for "productivity." Each non-DC37 union had to match the productivity "savings" offered by DC37 in order to get the 1%. It was all a lie. DC37 agreed to two changes they favored (civilianize the Police Department and have the City do more of its work "in house"). In return, the City announced great savings and gave a 1% raise. The City never did replace police officers doing clerical duties with clerical employees and they never did increase "contracting in." They did pay DC37 members the 1% raise.

Any other local that sought the 1% had to give up something concrete (like extra hours of work a year) except us. OSA held firm for years, even negotiating and settling two contracts while still arguing over the earlier 1%.

Finally, in February of 2007, the City insisted we drop our demand for the 1% in return for that period's 8% in raises and longevity. We broke off negotiations and accused the City of bargaining in bad faith.

Our argument was that the City was cheating on the pattern. Of course they were - and they settled the matter when it finally came before an Administrative Judge. They "discovered" that we would have twice as much of an increase in longevity as previously determined in return for our 1% equity in that contract, if, of course, we dropped our case.

So, since they were offering to turn a 1% equity award into a 2% award, we felt we would not wait for a judge to rule in OSA's favor. We just accepted the victory and have collected the money every year since.

More recently, we sought to exceed the pattern on a technicality. We would accept the 2010 to 2017 contract pattern, but we would ask for extra money. We were asking for some non-monetary demands as well, but we knew the extra money demand would trigger refusal by the City. It did.

Still, we had a good argument to make. Our Administrative Staff Analysts, Level I had been a part of our contract since 2001. They were getting nice longevity payments after 10, 15 or 20 years of service. We wanted the City to pay our more recently unionized Administrative Staff Analysts Levels II and III the same longevity.

The City said that they would agree to paying longevity to the Admin Levels II and III, but OSA had to fund the cost out of the raises due under the pattern. We refused. We said we would pay nothing and the City would be ordered, after arbitration, to pay with no help from OSA.

Our certainty that we had a strong case stemmed from an Office of Collective Bargaining case we lost in 1995, Robert J. Croghan vs. the City of New York. The case concerned a longevity award of one hundred dollars for an HHC title we had just come to represent. The ruling against us specified that when we won a new title to represent, we would have to "pay" in order to get the new title any longevity payments already coming to existing OSA titles.

The key word in the decision was "title." When we added Administrative Staff Analysts Levels II and III to our union, the new members were serving in a title that was not new to OSA. We already represented the Admin Analyst Level I. A Level is a level within a title series not a new title. Thus, we explained, the City owed the new Admins the same longevity as the Admins I.

The City refused to pay and the matter went to impasse. There, fearful that an arbitrator would rule in OSA's favor, the City offered to pay half the Admin Levels II and III's longevity if OSA would pay the other half. OSA, fearful that an arbitrator would rule against OSA's case accepted the City's half pay offer but declined to pay the other half.

So, we did get extra money above the pattern, but only because we had a good argument. Most recently, the City apparently spent most of a four year negotiation coming to terms with exceeding the pattern in our favor. Little of that time was spent talking to us about it.

We had expected a quick negotiation and settlement, but had we known that the City was seriously debating raising nearly two dozen minimum salaries, we would have understood the delay.

Keep in mind that the City normally would try to "charge" us for raising a minimum salary. We can only wonder how much raising over 20 minimums by 30 percent would have cost us if they thought we would ever agree to pay such a fortune.

We had raised, in each of our contract demands over the years, the need to adjust upward the minimum salaries for titles we now represented that had formerly been part of the Managerial Pay Plan. We had never been willing to pay for such an adjustment out of monies due to all members and we had never been willing to delay completion of a contract over the issue either.

The first hint we received in May of 2019, that the City had come to agree with us, was met with our disbelief. The fact that the first hint led to no substantive talks on the topic, for months thereafter, further led the union to not take the City seriously.

A bit later came the Covid delay. When we forced the City back to the table as soon as Covid seemed to wane, we learned that the City was seriously intent on giving in to our demand for higher minimums, but also wanted us to pay part of the cost.

That was not going to happen.

As we made our position clear, the City chose to come up with a compromise, to increase the minimums, but to "red circle" all incumbents.

When the City first proposed this compromise, OSA's leaders were at a loss for an answer. It did make sense to increase the minimum salaries, but it did not make sense to leave any workers behind earning less than the new minimum.

The City was willing to sweeten the offer a bit by agreeing, in response to union demands, to raise some of the new minimums upward over their first proposal, and to allow a generous interpretation as to how a "red circle" employee could leave that circle. We already understood that either an Agency "Personnel Action Request" or a promotion was a ticket to a higher salary, but now we were told that even a lateral transfer could result in an employee receiving the new minimum salary.

We were aware that all of our members were impatient for a settlement after years of delay and so we chose to accept the City's offer. Had we thought that fighting further had much chance of success, we would have considered doing so. Unfortunately, we saw no path for forcing the City on the issue.

We will raise the issue of the "Red Circle" in our next contract, but it is our hope that by that point many, if not most, of those affected will have received appropriate salary adjustments.

A few members have called in asking why there was no raise in 2020. The short answer is that the pattern did not call for one.

Active members can expect to receive raises in October or November. Retired members, if due an increase under the contract, will be paid retroactively sometime later. Thereafter, the New York City Employees Retirement System will also move to increase the retirement allowance to include raises received and this too can lead to a retroactive check. This last sort of check is normally a long time coming due to the complexity of calculation. Still, up to this point, our union has not yet come across an error in NYCERS' final calculations.

MEDICARE ADVANTAGE... The move of most of our retirees away from the "Medigap" program known as GHI "Senior Care" to a new "NYC Medicare Advantage Plus" program has caused much concern since last March when it was first discussed.

When details became available, the new program resembled closely the old program. The drugs are a bit cheaper and a small hearing aid benefit was added plus transportation to and from hospitals and medical appointments. There is an option for meals to be delivered in some circumstances plus a few "wellness" options. On the downside, there is an increase in the number of visits subject to a $15 copay and the same for tests and therapy. This latter downside is mitigated somewhat by a $1470 annual cap.

Those of our members being affected are receiving detailed mailings from the insurers and the information need not be repeated here.

Active members who will someday be Medicare retirees should know that the MLC Health Technical Subcommittee did a good job. We did want Emblem and Empire to be selected over their competition, since major change frightened our retirees and continuing the systems we know reassured many.

We expect to keep our doctors and hospitals unchanged and, that too, is reassuring.

For those with special needs or for those just more cautious than most, Emblem has agreed to continue "Senior Care" as an option, although at a $191.57 per month brand new premium, plus about $3 per month more for 365 day hospital care.

Those in the HIP/VIP program, since it is already a Medicare Advantage program, can opt to keep it at no cost.

The cost for the other premium plans is now available on this website on the "Retirees" tab and all are expected to remain as options. Our union is not sure how long that will play out long-term if too few opt into the premium plans.

Why did all this occur?

Apparently, the federal government has been convinced by the private health insurance industry that Medicare Advantage is the way to go.

On the positive side, there is less paperwork under the new program. Retirees now get forms from Medicare and also from their supplemental insurance carrier for each visit. There are even two separate deductibles each year. That stops under Medicare Advantage.

Also positive, if less certain, arguments have been made that wellness programs will help us live longer and lead more healthy lives. The Medicare Advantage companies swear they will do a better job looking out for us than is now the case. This, we are told, will drive down health costs.

Congress bought this idea and has provided subsidies to Medicare Advantage programs so they can outbid traditional Medigap supplemental insurance models.

There is a negative side also.

Many Medicare Advantage programs are avoided by doctors and hospitals since they are slow-pay or no-pay all too often. Other "M/A" programs specialize in wonderful advertising and dreadful small print.

The basic question of who do you trust, the government or the private sector, is generally answered by most of us as "neither."

As government workers, we know the government has its failings, but the private sector – with its emphasis on profit over all - can be worse.

Our American health care is unsatisfactory on a national level. It was our retirees fear of losing their relatively satisfactory health care that added drama and demonstrations to this year's "Medicare Advantage" debate.

The program finally negotiated seems to meet our needs for the next five years. It was designed to have as little change as possible and if that turns out to be the reality in practice, we will be well satisfied.

A brief postscript to this Medicare Advantage discussion is appropriate. One argument loudly brought forth was that the retirees were not being represented in these negotiations. That was not true.

It is true that active service unions have always negotiated health benefits for their retired brothers and sisters. Those unions are the collective bargaining agent for both active and retired members. The argument that retirees were not being represented appeared to be an effort to split retirees from active members. It did not work.

Michael Mulgrew, head of the UFT, did not have to be a retiree himself to represent his retired parents (and his wife's parents as well). All four mentioned retirees would expect Michael to do a good job.

It is also true that one of OSA's representatives to the Municipal Labor Committee Health Technical Subcommittee is John Mazzarella who is himself an OSA retiree. Many of our best union activists, after retiring from City employ, remain in service to the Municipal Labor Committee so that retiree interests were well represented throughout the process.

As Anthony Wells, President of SSEU Local 371, stated on this topic, the MLC consists of nothing but retirees or future retirees "in training."

VACCINATION...In March of 1947, smallpox arrived in New York City. It had been here before so our City knew what to do. We did it better than even we had expected. In two weeks, it is claimed, we had vaccinated 5,000,000 people. A week later we may have added another million. By April 24th the US Public Health Service declared the outbreak at an end. This was the last outbreak of smallpox in America.

The story was so big at the time that a (somewhat fictionalized) movie was made about it in 1950, "The Killer That Stalked New York." The movie shows up on classic television and has some scenes filmed on location here.

Smallpox was a worse disease than COVID, with a 30% normal death rate, plus severe scarring for life of those who survived. It was also better known, with vaccinations ordered by General George Washington as early as February of 1777.

The Organization of Staff Analysts Welfare Fund Trustees favor vaccination against COVID, since the shots seem to add a lot of protection and, thus far, few if any down sides. At the same time, we are opposed to mandatory vaccination.

Our Trustees decided to offer a Health Benefit Award to all members receiving the vaccination, believing that those who were undecided would be more likely to volunteer as a result. Those who were firm in their opposition would, we hoped, be less likely to be forced by their employer if enough did volunteer.

We have no idea what will be an acceptably high level of vaccination to the authorities. We note that NYC was able to declare victory over small pox in 1947. All of us would welcome a similar declaration for our City soon.

AFFILATION... Our investigation of the possibility of affiliation with a larger AFL-CIO union has continued. Most recently, there were extensive talks with the Office and Professional Employees International Union and the Marine Engineers Beneficial Association.

Both are excellent national unions and are willing to continue our independence as a local union.

MEMBERSHIP MEETING... The September membership meeting was canceled due to COVID. To be sure, as of September, our members were all supposed to be back at work but, even so, our Executive Board voted to err on the side of caution.

The one item we all looked forward to in September was to vote on the 2017-2021 contract. There were 1987 votes in favor and 11 opposed. Seven votes were invalid as being returned in un-numbered envelopes and six arrived blank and were counted as abstaining.

The contract is accepted.

OTHER MATTERS... We are enclosing in the mailing of this newsletter some items of special interest and posting others only on this website. All items, enclosed in the physical mailing or not, are linked below:

BITS AND PIECES ...