2014 Town Union Contract key points for voters

Collective Bargaining

Contract Changes

Rye Employees Teamsters #633

January 23, 2014

1. Article 33, Duration. Term of Contract: 3 years.
2. Article 22, Wages.
   1. a. COLA for all 3 years. Current contract language. Tied to the NCIP
3. Article 21, Insurance, Section 3. Heath Insurance:
   1. BC/BS Comp 2500 plan will be closed to new employees.
   2. We will bring on a lower cost Mathew Thornton Plan for all new hires, with a higher subscriber co-pay for prescription meds. The Town will not pay any deductibles or co-pays for new hires.
   3. 75/25% premium co-share for all new hires. The current co-share is 80/20 and will remain so for all current employees with the exception of single person. That will increase to 15% premium co-share over life of contract. Right now it’s 10%.
   4. We agree to establish a labor management health care committee to look at alternate plans with the goal of reducing the cost for all parties.
   5. New Language: Both parties agree to reopen this contract to negotiate changes in good faith  to insure this agreement complies with the Affordable Care Act, and other state, federal, or local insurance and/or health care reform legislation, and to avoid being subject to fees (including but not limited to, taxes/fees because employees are eligible to obtain subsidized or discounted insurance through an insurance exchange); or to avoid the coverage being subject to “Cadillac” taxes (a.k.a. the excise tax on high cost employer-sponsored health coverage).
4. Article 8, Seniority, Section 7, Par 3:  Delete: “and thereafter from other town departments”. This is a language change having to do with promoting someone. Right now the contract could be read as prohibiting the town from seeking outside candidates.
5. Article 5, Grievance Procedure, Section 5.05, Par 2:  Increase time to meet with the Selectmen to 10 days.
6. Article 14, Vacation Leave, Section 7: Add “Under no circumstances will an employee or their estate be paid for more than 240 hours of accumulated vacation time”.
7. Article 13, Holidays, Section 5: Delete floating holiday. Under the current contract employees can take MLK Day as a “floating holiday”, meaning choosing to work on the holiday and take it off later. We wanted to eliminate that practice.
8. Article 15, Sick Leave, Section 1: Cap accumulation at 400 hours for new hires. Current employees are grandfathered and can still accumulate leave.