Our summer mailing is due out this week and should be received by you early next week. If you can't wait, the electronic version will be on our website late this week.
There is a lot of information and also coupons and various classes and other offers. Want your free subscription to the Civil Service Chief newspaper. It's there. Want to sign up for the intensive classes of delegate training available this Fall? You have that option.
There are still other classes, but there is also information about the Labor Day Parade. It's to be held on Saturday, September 10th. We gather at 46th Street and Madison Avenue at 11AM. T-shirts and hats, water and snacks are distributed before the march. We gather together after the march for our traditional full lunch at a lovely diner. If you plan to attend, and we hope you will, let us know you are coming by emailing Ken Kearns at kkearns@osaunion.org or call Ken or Rob Spencer at the union office at 212-686-1229.
Bring a friend or bring your kids. This year, we welcome our brothers and sisters from the Staten Island Ferry. We are proud to join them on their march towards a successful contract after an eleven year fight for fair pay.
There is also a Labor Mass at St. Patrick's Cathedral before the parade, starting at 8:30AM. All union members are invited. If you plan to go to the Mass, let Ken Kearns know at kkearns@osaunion.org.
Finally, there are two fixed deadlines coming up shortly for individuals with 9/11 exposures. For those who may have engaged in rescue, recovery or clean-up work on or after 9/11, there is a deadline coming up on 9/11/22 to file a Notice of Participation Form (622) with the NYC Employees Retirement System (NYCERS) to preserve the right to either apply for an accidential disability pension benefit or, if already retired, to reclassify your pension benefit to accidental disability status or to allow beneficiaries to receive such a benefit after you die. You can download the NYCERS 622 form
at this link. You can find additional information in this frequently asked questions document.
There is also a deadline on 9/11/22 to file a WTC-12 Registration of Participation Form in World Trade Center Rescue, Recovery, and/or Clean-Up Operations with the NYS Workers' Compensation Board.You can download that form at this link. This applies to employees or volunteers who participated in WTC rescue, recovery and clean-up operations between 9-11-01 and 9-12-02. For more information, refer to this page on the Workers' Compensation Board website.
If you would like to listen to this newsline as an audio file, please click on this link:
However, before those results, we note that Ukraine still lives.
Also, members should be aware that if you vote on August 23rd, you may be eligible to request two hours off for voting. Submit a leave of absence form to your supervisor two days in advance. This offer does not apply to early or absentee voting, but do vote as you wish and do vote.
On a less happy note, the Department of Citywide Administrative Services is responding to Monkeypox as they did for Covid. If you test positive for Monkeypox, you can receive two weeks of excused leave. If, after two weeks, your doctor wants you to continue to isolate, the excused leave can be increased to up to four weeks. You can read the full procedure at the following link:
Finally, the Department of Education approved their unit contract by a vote of 27 to accept to zero to reject and our Uniformed Unit at the New York City Police Department also voted approval by a vote of 41 to accept to two to reject.
Congratulations to Adam Orgel and the two bargaining teams for the hard work in completing their contracts. See a photo from the ballot counting above.
Check back on August 29th.
If you would like to listen to this newsline as an audio file, please click on this link:
We delayed this newsline half a week to be able to report on two contract votes.