KEA staff protest proposed benefit cuts – by the Kentucky teachers' union

Tom Loftus | Courier Journal

Show Caption Hide Caption Kentucky teachers union members demonstrate against KEA Kentucky's teachers' union, which successfully demonstrated against the pension bill, is the target of an informational demonstration by its own staff

FRANKFORT, Ky. — The Kentucky Education Association found itself on the opposite end of a Capital Avenue demonstration Saturday about employee benefits.

About 25 members of the union that represents the KEA's staff picketed the teachers' union headquarters just a few blocks from the state Capitol. Demonstrators said the KEA is being unfair in seeking to take back benefits in negotiations for a new contract.

"The irony is, of course, that KEA is an organization devoted to representing school employees and getting fairness for those employees's in dealings with their employer," said Dennis Janes, an attorney who works for the KEA and was among the demonstrators. "We don't feel that we have been fairly treated in the negotiations that we've had with KEA management."

Janes said the demonstrators are members of Kentucky Education Association Staff Organization, the union that represents 53 KEA employees.

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KEA President Stephanie Winkler, who was meeting with other KEA leaders inside the Frankfort headquarters on Saturday, said the KEA has been fair in its talks with the staff.

"Our staff is exercising their right to informational picket," she said. "They're within their right to do what they're doing."

The conflict is over a new collective bargaining contract covering terms and conditions of employment with the union representing the employees. The current three-year contract expires at the end of this month.

The current contract prohibits disclosure of the current negotiations, so each side was guarded in commenting about any particular issue impeding current talks.

But comments from the two sides indicate the KEA wants to roll back some benefits within the current contract.

"Negotiations are always about wages and benefits. The current contract is very generous and they (Kentucky Education Association Staff Organization members) are interested in keeping everything in their current contract," said Mary Ruble, executive director of the KEA.

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Asked if KEA has proposed to scale back benefits, Ruble said, "We are negotiating about what's in the current contract."

Janes said, "Suffice it to say, the benefits are being proposed to be reduced."

Craig Carter, who works in the KEA's Paducah office and is president-elect of the union that represents the staff, said, "We want to have the fair health insurance benefit that we currently have ... We want no takebacks."

But Charles Main, a retired KEA staff member who was president of the staff’s union when the existing contract was negotiated, said that contract contains benefits far superior to those of public school teachers in Kentucky. Main said, for instance, that KEA staff members currently pay nothing for excellent health care coverage.

Main said he expected the KEA would seek some concessions this year so that its staff's benefits would be more in line with those of the KEA members whose dues pay for the staff's benefits.

Carter said Saturday's demonstration is consistent with what the KEA itself was doing all winter long when it organized repeated mass demonstrations on Capitol Avenue and inside the Capitol to protest legislation that would cut pension benefits of teachers and other public employees.

"Just as we worked so hard and diligently to represent the greater good of public education in Kentucky and the public school employees, we want that same treatment for our staff too," Carter said.

Asked how she felt about being on the opposite end of a demonstration about employee benefits, Winkler said, "We are in negotiations with our staff and we still have lots of scheduled dates to continue to negotiate. And we're positive that it will resolve into a contract."

Last winter's demonstrations by the KEA, joined by other groups representing public employees and retirees, helped cause the Republican majorities of the House and Senate to reject early pension reform proposals that would have significantly cut public pension benefits. The final bill that was zipped to passage late in the legislative session makes some relatively small benefit cuts, but it largely affects future teachers.

It would put teachers who start beginning in 2019 in a less secure hybrid cash balance retirement plan similar to a 401(k) plan rather than the traditional pension plan with defined benefits.

The KEA was among the plaintiffs who filed suit to block that law from taking effect.

Franklin Circuit Court Judge Phillip Shepherd ruled in their favor and struck the new law down on procedural grounds. He ruled that because the bill was unveiled and passed in a single day the process violated the state constitution's requirement that each bill be read on three separate days in each chamber. He also ruled it did not get sufficient votes to pass in the House.

Gov. Matt Bevin has appealed that ruling to the Kentucky Supreme Court, which is scheduled to hear arguments in the case on Sept. 20.

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Tom Loftus: tloftus@courierjournal.com; Twitter: @TomLoftus_CJ. Support strong local journalism by subscribing today: courier-journal.com/toml.