Scrambling to fill a $2 billion state budget gap, Gov. David Paterson said this week that he expected to have to make mid-year state budgets cuts in health-care and school aid, and planned to urge labor unions to renegotiate existing contracts. Three of the most powerful state labor leaders responded even before the governor got to make a formal request. They said that they have no interest in reopening contracts. “If there’s an incentive being offered in exchange for what they would be giving up, then local leaders may entertain that,” Civil Service Employees Association President Danny Donohue said.

Well, what is in it for them? Perhaps a way to avoid mass layoffs for state employees and maintain state services. Perhaps a way to help contain an ever-widening circle of economic doom and gloom – for public employees, and all who pay their salaries and benefits. The unions certainly have no obligation to renegotiate signed deals, but if the fiscal crisis gets as bad as the governor predicts – $47 billion in deficits over the next four years – it would be in the unions’ best interest to renegotiate.

Taxpayers certainly have an interest in the disposition of those pacts – though it is often hard to tell. A conservative think-tank, the Empire Center for Public Policy, has called for an end to the secrecy surrounding contract negotiations with public-employee labor unions. Shining the light of day on public contract negotiations could be an effective way to keep salaries and benefits in check

Often government officials keep details of a negotiation secret until a contract is ratified – when it is too late for the public to have a chance to protest against overly generous deals. The lack of public scrutiny benefits unions during the negotiation.

One example cited in an Empire Center report was the tentative accord reached last month by Westchester County and its largest union, the Civil Service Employees Association Unit 9200. The contract for 4,000 civil service workers – they had been working without one since 2005 – called for a 22 percent raise over six years (retroactive to 2005) and no health-care contributions. The county didn’t release a copy of the memorandum of understanding guiding the contract until six days after the union had mailed out ballots, giving taxpayers, who pay those salaries, no voice until the parameters were already established. (County officials say that under such circumstances the public has a chance to express its opinion – or outrage – before the Board of Legislators weighs in.)

This brings us to Ossining, where teachers have been working without a contract since June and have now reached an impasse in negotiations with the school district. A lawyer for the school board told Journal News staff writer Robert Marchant that issues beyond the district’s control – such as a possible double-digit cut in state aid – were impacting the negotiations.

How could state budget issues not impact negotiations? The teachers’ union, and every other public employee union, should take note:

Everything is on the negotiating table right now, because it has to be.

Read article here