News for August 2003:

I am writing this on the eve of the opening of contract negotiations. I have been active in the union for most of my 17 years with Hennepin County. At no time previously have I felt as concerned about negotiations as I do this year. What makes it worse is the news from the State bargaining which makes their previous contract, the result of a 2-week strike, seem like a picnic. Imagine what it would be like to have to pay over $3000 more per year for your health insurance! That is what the State of Minnesota is telling its unions they must do to make up for the state budget crisis and the fact that the governor and the legislature were unwilling to raise revenue. It is my understanding from both union and media sources that the state intends to give the unions a “take or leave it” last offer and then terminate the current contracts, leaving state employees no option but to take it or to go out on strike.

The news here in Hennepin County looks just as bad. We had a meet and Confer on August 5th and we were told that our department is having difficulty meeting its goal of cutting $8.7 million from its budget and may have to look at reducing FTE's beyond that of the 43 that were reduced from the early incentive offered by the county earlier this year. I fear that this means that lay-offs are now likely in all job classifications, including probation/parole officers. There are several rounds of budget negotiations ahead. Our department submits a budget to the county administrator, who will make revisions and submit them to the county board. The county board has to make a decision in September on how much they will increase the property tax levy and then identify what their priorities will be. The board does not have to make a final budget decision until December. We have been told that our department has 6 core areas that will be its budget priorities. 1. Juvenile Detention Center. 2. Juvenile Probation Supervision. 3. Adult Probation Supervision. 4. The Adult Corrections Facility. 5. Family Court Services. 6. Services to the Court. They have promised that cuts in administration will happen and that contracted programs will be cut ahead of our jobs. Currently, they plan on eliminating the 5 PO positions and the ACF and reallocating them throughout the department. At the same time, we are also looking at a major restructuring of Probation Field services that would move more of us into community based offices. At the same time, the court will receive less and less information on offenders at sentencing and we will likely have people placed on our caseloads who are not appropriate for probation supervision.

It sure would be easy to sit back and blame union leadership for these things. Oh, we could blame our own administration too. We could go on and on with finger pointing. Or, we could stand up and stand behind our union. We could volunteer to plan rallies, attend political functions and let the folks who are making these decisions know what the real consequences are! Our union and the future of our profession needs not just your passive support by paying your union dues, we need you to stand up, write letters, make phone calls. Everything we do is important and has value to the people of Hennepin County. If we cut pay, cut health insurance, cut hours, who really suffers? Paul Wellstone once said: “We all do better when we all do better”. If we all stand together, we can fight cuts in salaries, we can fight cuts in our health insurance or increased premiums. We have earned our stability pay and severance pay. There are too many people who need probation and parole supervision, we should not be laying off or cutting the number of probation/parole officers! I am truly blessed to have had the support of so many of you. Lets reach out to those who have strong opinions and bring them with us! We have too much in common, to feud over minor differences!