Present: Amanda Castle, Mary Scovill, Stacey Mueller, Erin Wiederich, Joe Norgren, Scott Axtell, Deb Evans, Katie Endresen, Jean Sandland, Shane Bohnert, Tom Keck, Brian Veith, Connie Anderson, Molly Kennedy, Tim Headlee, Mike Homer, Eric Hesse, Luke Frederick, Matt Stenger, Ryan Cates, Chris Hanson
1. Secretary’s Report: No changes to be made. Motion to accept subject to audit by Molly Kennedy, 2nd by James Hemshrot. Motion passed.
2. Treasurer-Antonio Guerrero: STATEMENT OF INCOME AND EXPENSES FOR MONTH ENDING March 2016 CASH BALANCE BEGINNING OF MONTH: $ 65637.00 INCOME FOR THE MONTH: $ 5861.83 EXPENSES FOR THE MONTH: $ 8567.82 CASH BALANCE ENDING OF MONTH: $ 62931.01 SUBMITTED BY: Antonio Guerrero, Motion to accept by Molly Kennedy, 2nd by Stacey Mueller
3. Correspondence: • International Convention: This is coming up soon. It is July 17th – 22nd in Las Vegas. o Molly Kennedy will be taking names of those interested in going. Only those seriously interested please because once signed up you are unable to back out. Please note that you do need the time off to attend. Tim Headlee will be getting more information this week including the amount of delegates we are allowed. If there are more interested than allowed there will be a vote at May’s General Membership (May 19th, 4:30 pm @ Hobber’s). Any member in good standing is able to go. o International Convention is all of AFSCME throughout the country. We come together and talk about things looking towards workers favor. This will be a political year. Voting to change the International Constitution takes place as well. In order for us to be able to do electronic voting a change in the International Constitution would need to happen. Anything that is our bi-law has to be approved through international. A proposal must be put forward. From there we can come up with a committee to get an idea of what electronic voting would look like and what it would cost. Our local constitution is due to be reviewed as well because it was last done in 2007. It is the prime time to introduce some of these things. • State Employee Policy Committee (SEPC): This will be Friday, April 29th at the Radisson Blu Mall of America. Registration starts at 7am, the conference begins at 9am. o There was an email sent out asking for members interested. Molly Kennedy received 6 names. Molly made a motion for up to 10 people to attend with rate of pay and mileage. We encourage carpooling. 2nd by Shane Bohnert. Motion passed. • Steward Training is being held Tuesday, April 26th at the Redmen from 9am – 4pm. There are 12 people signed up. Those attending will be learning about grievances, collective bargaining, unionism, collective actions, etc. Ryan Wells from Council 5 will be doing the bulk of the training along with Molly Kennedy and Chris Hanson. Molly made a motion to cover per diem and lunch for those attending and the instructors. 2nd by Ryan Cates. Motion passed. • Drazkowski Bill: An email was received yesterday, April 20th, asking for a show of opposition for the hearing on HF 3585 (Rep. Drazkowki’s Scott Walker-style attack on public employees). Because we have our General Membership Meeting Local 404 was unable to participate. For more information you can contact Kris Fredson, Political Director, at 651-235-4459 or [email protected]
4. New Business:
5. Old Business: • Sweatshirts: AFSCME followed Robert’s Rule of Order when voting on the purchase of sweatshirts. The interest was expressed in the January 2016 General Membership Meeting Minutes. Members were interested and Ryan Cates expressed that interest to the meeting. When we make these orders and they are passed we cannot go back on them. An Amendment can be made at that time. We would like to move past the issue. 400 members so far have expressed that they want the sweatshirts. o If we want to open up new motions to this we can. We have chosen as an E-Board to not chime in over the state server because it is very unhealthy. Everyone does have a right to their opinion. People are feeding off of info that was invalid. We do recognize that there is a disconnect. We look to Stewards and Chief Stewards to field questions members have. The President of Council 5, Eliot Seide (651-450-4990), has stated that he is more than willing to field questions about this as well. o When purchases like this are made it focuses on solidarity and a show of support. Paying back dues isn’t something we can do because we do not set the dues. The Local receives $1.50 of the dues taken out. o Tom Keck made a motion to give those who do not want a sweatshirt something else with a similar value, like a gas card. An option with cash value (like a gas card) is not an option because something like that would need to be given to fair share as well. The purchase needs to have the AFSCME logo on it. This is also an effective way to show management our solidarity. It was asked what the difference was between a gas card and a turkey. The turkeys were a holiday thing. Motion was changed to move the sweatshirt deadline to May 16th by Tom Keck. 2nd by Molly Kennedy. Motion passed. o We strongly advise that members not have long conversations over the state server. With the most recent string the emails were sent to supervisors as well. Member have asked about a blog. Matt Stenger stated that our site is through Unionware and is a program that is automatically set up. We can only input information. There is not a way to create a separate blog that we know of. We do have our Facebook page. A new site is being worked on (afscme.icedcomputers.com is the temporary holding for the site) but it is a very long process to transfer everything.
6. Items from the membership: • Location of General Membership: o Can we change the location? Tim Headlee stated that it is difficult enough to get members to show at our central location of St. Peter. Tim stated that if he could see a list of names of people who would attend at a new listed location, we would try it. o A member asked if having the meeting on a Saturday would be an option. Tim Headlee stated that if there was a list of names expressing they would attend, we can bring it to an E-Board meeting for a vote. o Chris Hanson stated that this is a common theme among all locals. He stated that meetings are not where the business gets done. We need to bring it to the work site and spread a message. It is about communication and organization. o We rotate times to try to accommodate different shifts. It has been kept on the 3rd Thursday so more of the E-Board can attend the MSH Meet & Confer which is the same day. According to contract 1 local unit officer an early shift once a month on the day of the General Membership (page 428 under Union Meetings in our supplemental). • Members at MSH need to start taking Incident Command sooner. It has been noticed that there is a trend where the same supervisors are taking IC right away. This will be an agenda item at the May MSH Meet & Confer. Members are concerned documentation is being altered when speaking to assault or aggression wording. A member was told that spitting is not assault. There is another instance where a member was bit in the back of the head but told a few days later that it was too late to report to the Police Department. We will be requesting copies of these Incident Command Reports. • AFSCME needs an Injured on Duty contact person. Tom Keck said that he will be that person for nights. Tim Headlee stated that we would like for there to be 1 person for all members. Tom stated that he is writing something for Keir to include in New Employee Orientation speaking to IOD out of contract definition and what OSHA provides. • Please do not look up anything on Avatar unless you absolutely have to. This is a no win grievance situation.
7. Officer Reports
Presidents Report:
VP-Matt Stenger: We are currently in the process on trying to schedule a date with the administration to talk about 24/48 rule and 7.5 hours between shifts. We are hoping to an agreement and get the MOU drafted in the near future. On top of that we have done a lot of work trying to get a budget passed that will provide additional relief to all departments on camps. Next week we are scheduled to meet with a few different legislators about our budget proposal.
VP- Molly Kennedy: April 2016 Report We attended MSOP meet and confer on April 14th. Some of the items discussed was the implementation of the new scheduling program and when we should expect to access it at home, documentation that HR has been using for grievance resolutions without it being in the contract, new procedure on pat searches and property, Shift differential page 50 of the contract and how it was being applied differently and lastly changing shifts inside of 14 days. Please see www.union404.com for the discussion on these topics.
There is a steward training scheduled for Tuesday April 26th from 9am-4pm at the RedMen club. There is still room in the class so if you have the time off and are interested in attending then please email me.
I would like to address the email chain that has been going on for a couple of weeks over the state server. I totally understand that people are full of opinions and that is fine, but to express them over a state server is not a great idea. If there is something that you think your elected chair members are not doing correctly, please let us know or if you feel more comfortable going through a steward, there are lots of them you can contact. In looking back at our meeting minutes it was discussed in January’s meeting and nothing was expressed by the membership then. Also the reason that sweatshirts even came about is because of many members expressed an interest in wanting one. Why sweatshirts that say AFSCME you ask? It shows the employers that we are standing together on the issues that we are fighting for, examples being safe staffing, workplace violence etc… I’m not sure why you think people run for chair officer positions, but I can tell you, that I do it because I really like to help people, I believe that I serve as an advocate for people that don’t want to stand up and have their voice heard. If you think this is a glamorous position and that people have hidden agendas and a ton of personal gain, you are wrong. There is literally no time for that. I answer a minimum of 100 union related question a week that require research and follow up. I handle grievances, meet and confer agendas, uphold contract language and put out fires with management on a daily basis. Did I mention that I work full time and have a husband and kids in sports? I have heard every excuse in the book over in the last couple weeks about how people don’t have the time to attend meetings that occur once per month, well I don’t either but I believe in our union to help us maintain our salary, retirement, insurance and day to day operations, so I take the time out of my busy life to get involved and make a difference. Don’t get me wrong I’m not complaining, I’m just explaining how I contribute to do my share. If you feel the need to give your opinion about what I had to say in this report please feel free to call. You can find my cell phone number on our union website that is listed above that I take calls on at home to answer union questions.
In Solidarity, Molly Kennedy Vice President Steward Coordinator Local 404
Executive Board: James Hemshrot
Executive Board: Tom Keck
Executive Board: Stacey Mueller
CS MSH/Transition: Ryan Cates
I have filed grievances for a couple non-certs and also multiple overtime grievances. I filed and presented a class-action grievance regarding part time staff being inversed before single days off. Attended a committee hearing where Rep. Steve Drazkowski’s bill, that would force an unsafe, unfair, and unnecessary "Right to Work" law on public workers, was to be presented. Attended the Normal meetings with management. Organized the AFSCME sweatshirt order which included…. -I met with a representative of the company that is going to fulfill our order. -I responded to a few hundred emails with questions about the sweatshirt expenditure and process. -I shook my head at many of the amusing and grossly inaccurate mass emails that were circulated amongst our membership and management regarding this sweatshirt project. -I recorded and tallied the requests more than 500 of our members have so far made for sweatshirts.
CS CBHH / CARE & MSOP: Luke Frederick
CS FACILITY SUPPORT: Mike Homer
CS Nursing Home: Eric Hesse
CS MSH / CRP / Nursing Nights: Kurt Crosby
Council 5 Field Representative Chris Hanson:
Motion to adjourn meeting at 5:04 pm by James Hemshrot, 2nd by Stacey Mueller