Thursday, June 14, 2012

Expensive Austerity

While Milwaukee County Executive, Scott Walker tried to do a prototypical form of Act 10.

In 2009, Walker claimed that Milwaukee County was in the midst of a fiscal crisis and thus wanted to impose a reduced work week, where workers would lose five hours of pay each week.  Walker wanted to make this work reduction indefinite in length, claiming it necessary to fill the supposed hole in his budget.  The unions grieved this illegal decision, as they should, and won in arbitration.  It was ruled that per a previous arbitration ruling, the County could only impose 45 hours of reduced work time.  Not only that, it was discovered during the proceedings that there was actually no crisis and that there might not even have been a deficit.

While crafting his 2010 Milwaukee County Budget, Walker decided to include a money saving provision of nearly $20 million in concessions from the unions, even though he never sat down and asked the unions to make the concessions, even though he was supposed to be negotiating a new contract with the unions at the time.

Since he never came to the bargaining table much less made a proposal for the concessions, the unions were unable to reject or accept the wanted concessions.  Despite this fact, and with the aid of the corporate media, most significantly the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Walker waged a publicity war with the unions, claiming that the "greedy unions" wouldn't make the concessions he needed from them.

To make up for the hole in his illegal budget, but unable to used the reduced work week like he wanted to, Walker decided to impose furlough days on the workers.  What Walker apparently didn't understand, or just didn't care about, is that reduced work time is reduced work time, no matter what form it took.

Many workers got 12 days of furlough, while many more, including yours truly, got pinched for 26 days.  That's one every pay period or 10% of my pay being cut, not to mention the mayhem it's played with pensions, seniority and other issues, just so Walker could have a campaign talking point.  Even public safety workers, like Sheriff's deputies, weren't immune and were given eight furlough days.

To show his "fiscal conservatism" Walker illegally imposed another round of furlough days in his 2011 Milwaukee County budget as well.

The ironic thing is that any surplus Walker might have claimed from these stunts were made up in overtime to make up for all the missed work due to the furloughs and compounded by severe staffing shortages.

The unions grieved the excessive furloughs to the Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission (WERC).  Walker had the County stall this long enough to keep it from becoming a campaign issue.  Then, just a couple of months after he was sworn in as governor, WERC ruled in favor of the unions, stating that anything above the 45 hours was illegal.

The County has since tried to appeal this decision two more times, once back in front of WERC and once in circuit court.  Both times they came away with rulings against them.  Meanwhile, the back pay owed to the workers was accumulating interest at 12%, compounded daily.  This means that the bill was growing by about $35,000 a month.  Again, just to give Walker a campaign talking point.

On Wednesday, Corporation Counsel sent out a proposed resolution to the appropriate County Board committees, stating that their recommendation is to just pay the workers the money Walker illegally took from them.  From their report on the matter:
The decisions of the WERC and affirmed by the Circuit Court placed a limit of 45 hours on the number of annual furlough hours that could be imposed on AFSCME DC-48.  Based on the timing of the WERC decision in May 2011, an accrual of $2.0 million was made at the end of County’s 2010’s fiscal year.  The affirmation by the Circuit Court of the WERC decision in February 2012, required an additional accrual of $1.5 million in 2011 for costs associated with the furlough decision, including the accrual of interest costs, and no offset for outside revenue.  An additional accrual of $584,000 associated with employees of the Airport and the Department of Family Care were charged to those departments.   
The total accrued liability is $4.1 million for the payout of furlough hours that exceeded a 45 hour annual furlough limit as determined by the WERC.  These charges reduced the available surplus in 2010 by $2.0 million and in 2011 by $1.516 million.  The reported surplus for 2011 of $11.5 million has already been reduced by the furlough hours accrued cost of $1.5 million for 2011.
And that $4.1 million is just for the 2010 furloughs.  There is the issue of the furloughs in 2011, which jumps the bill up to over $6 million.

And who is going to pay the restitution for Walker's illegal politicking at the workers' expense?

Well, despite my semi-serious suggestion to sue Walker's campaign, Walker isn't go to part with a dime to pay restitution for his illegal activities.

And don't look at Walker's cheerleaders and apologists, like Owen Robinson or James Wigderson, to put their money where their mouths are.  Much like their hero, Walker, they like to bluster about but don't like to take responsibility for their choices.

No, it will be the taxpayers of Milwaukee County that will end up footing the bill for Walker's escapades.  It's just a shame that they can't have just the Walker supporters in Milwaukee County pay for it.  Since this is what they wanted, they should feel the full impact of their folly.

This turn of events also shows that the current Milwaukee County Executive, Chris Abele - who's now making himself look like a Democratic version of Walker by claiming to have an $11.5 million surplus, also balanced on the back of the workers - isn't any better than Walker was.  

But all of this should also make one pause to wonder about Walker's claims that the state running a surplus.  I, for one, don't believe it for a second.  But Walker is willing to bet your money that it is.

Most of all, if you take nothing else away from this story, it does show why the unions are so sorely needed.  It would have been impossible for most workers, acting on an individual basis, to try to take the legal actions necessary to protect their right.

It's no wonder why Walker and his corporate backers want to bust the unions once and for all.  The unions are the only thing keeping them from exploiting workers completely.

21 comments:

  1. Sad but true, Chris. It's pretty much impossible to believe that anything good will come from the reinstatement of Walker as Governor. Also, does anyone believe that the election was won fair and square .... or do you believe that the voting machines were tampered with???

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    1. software can be easily programmed to flip votes. that is what happened. the exit polls were "adjusted" to match the official total. walker did not win this election. Wisconsin: None Dare Call It Vote Rigging http://www.freepress.org/columns/display/3/2012/1936

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    2. Get over yourself.

      You conspiracy theorists are pathetic.

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    3. Why did Wausau, Wisconsin lose 4,893 registered voters between April 3, 2012 and June 5, 2012?
      http://www.ci.wausau.wi.us/Services/Elections.aspx [their official website]
      Under voter turnout the numbers show that there are 24,828 registered voters on April 3, 2012, 19,702 on May 8, 2012 and 19,935 on June 5, 2012. WTF.
      This is the only city I found where the registered voters were posted. There must be more.

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  2. I want to know why Alberta Darling said, during an interview on Madison TV, that Walker would win with 53% of the vote, before all precincts were done reporting. What did Walker end up? With 53% of the vote....

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    1. Good point. I didn't know about that interview.

      Can we just add that restitution (and the restitution he'll have to make to the state) to his John Doe sentence?

      Yes, I think the fix was in.

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  3. At least we know why he has broken the backs of the unions. Every time he tried to save the taxpayers a nickel of increased taxes the unions were right there trying to get it back. I would argue that if they have all these laws in place protecting their rights what is the need for collective bargaining? Other than to try to get a bigger chunk of the tax levy.
    Hard to believe some of you are still in denial that your in the minority side of politics in this state.

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    1. we reallly and truly do not have "all of these laws" in place protecting workers rights. Just ask the workers of Palermos

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    2. Yes, he tried to break the unions in order to go about doing illegal activities and not be held accountable. Thank goodness that Walkergate and federal investigators are onto him.

      BTW, you might have missed the part about it not saving any money, but actually costing more?

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    3. I understood all Palermos did was ask immigration to check their employment roles for illegals. I'll bet they wish they found a different location for their factory.
      Capper, The legal option then I guess would be to just lay off people. Seems Milwaukee has had to many employees lately since Abelle can save millions by not filling vacancys.
      Oh, and since your a fiscal hawk now I am sure you'll agree that the recall elections cost the taxpayers more than the interest on the furloughs, and in the end neither one was justified.

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    4. if there is one thing that I am absolutely certain of, it is that the recall was extremely justified!!!

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    5. I would argue that it wasnt. Being as he still has majority support. We still need recalls, but the constitution should be changed to prevent the minority opinions from doing this again, Or we will have perpetual recalls, no matter which party is in the minority.

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    6. How about adding a referendum provision so specific pieces of legislation can be overturned by the voters? That way the recall would only be called into play for egregiously bad, offensive or serially stupid elected officials. All of which, personally, I still think Scott Walker is, even if "only" 46% of my fellow Wisconsin voters happen to agree with me. I would have been just as happy to put Act 10 and the whole "It's working!" fairy tale directly under a microscope; it would have been more effective (we still would have had Act 10 even if Barrett had won) and more to the point.

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    7. IMBR had he campaigned originally on ACT10 i would agree with you. However we know that he campaigned on the EXACT opposite and that he had ACT10 planned the whole time. That blatant lie was worthy of malfeasance in office and worthy of recall.

      I am still in awe that we have him on numerous videos outright lying yet the repubs and the Wi media still perpetuate the myth that he did what he ran on!

      SMH!

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    8. IMBR,

      A) With Abele's "surplus," there's enough money to give us our back pay and restore the cuts from Act 10 and still come out ahead.

      B) The cost of the recalls are negligible compared to the money Walker's agenda has cost the taxpayers, through higher taxes, more unemployed people and kicking the debt down the road.

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  4. Next, he'll move on to privatizing every program in the state while he and his cronies proceed to rape it. Wait until teapartiers stop getting checks, see their state along with all infrastructure erode, RTW and relaxed child labor laws inserted and Veterans Benefits disappear.

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    1. Yes, as a few teachers I know said that if you thought the first round of cuts were bad, just wait for the 2nd round it is much worse. I want to know just where the money goes once a state asset is sold. More tax cuts for the rich?

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  5. Capper certainly explains the crux of the matter here. Governor Walker, no matter which executive position he's held, has never been willing or able to negotiate with public employers. His MO has always been to publicly issue his proposals and threats via the media and then move on them unilaterally without any other input. We saw this with the Milwaukee County furlough and the Act10 enactment.

    Quite frankly, I don't think the governor has the courage to actually face the opposition and support his own 'convictions' (pun not intended but I chuckled anyway).

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    1. able to negotiate with public employers: should be public EMPLOYEES...yikes

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  6. How did walker get away with doing all that stuff and he was able to keep his county executive job? I hope the FBI and D.A. are looking into every thing walker has done as county executive in their investigations.

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    1. He got away with it because the local media didn't want to report it.

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