The Crozer bargaining team has been working hard to come to agreement with the CCPA before your current contract expires on October 15.
We hoped to get an early start, but the CCPA bargaining team did not meet with us until September 23. At that meeting we gave the CCPA a full set of proposals, including economics. Most of our proposals are identical to those already accepted by PASNAP in the new contract for Crozer RNs. But after four meetings the CCPA has still not responded to all of our proposals.
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Here is a summary of our key proposals:
Wages
Comparable to the agreement PASNAP RNs have already ratified including modest wage increases in years 2 and 3 with continued step increases in year 1.
Health Insurance
The identical Excellent Choices Benefit Plan that already applies to more than 5,000 other Crozer-Keystone employees including, as of January 1, 2012, PASNAP RNs.
Pension
Identical to the agreement PASNAP RNs have already ratified with current staff remaining in the Defined Benefit Pension Plan and new hires entering the Defined Contribution Retirement Plan.
New Hire Wages
Comparable to the agreement PASNAP RNs have already ratified with a separate new hire wage scale while current paramedics and EMTs retain the same scale with increases in years 2 and 3.
Hours
Schedules prepared by the Scheduling Committee subject to approval, with the Chief or his designee retaining discretion to control overtime.
Overtime
Overtime to be avoided whenever possible with OT fairly distributed among staff with seniority as the tiebreaker.
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The CCPA bargaining team has proposed a complete rewrite of many contract articles — proposals that could require months of negotiations to complete. But there are only two more negotiation sessions scheduled before the contract expires. We can still reach agreement if the CCPA team will focus on the key elements of the economic package — many of which PASNAP has already accepted for the RNs. For that reason we have rejected the CCPA team’s request for a contract extension.
Negotiations are scheduled for October 12 and 13.
If you have any questions regarding what is on the table, please do not hesitate to ask the Chief or an Assistant Chief.
