Another large Pa. state employees union agrees to one-year contract with Wolf Administration

The Wolf Administration has taken another step toward labor peace with ratification of a new, one-year contract by Local 668 of the Service Employees International Union.

The pact covers about 10,000 nurses, case-workers and other human service employees working in state government.

Administration officials said the terms are identical in all major parts to the contract ratified last month by District Council 13 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, the largest state workers' union.

That means SEIU employees will get a 2.25 percent pay increase in January, and all current health care benefits are carried over through 2015-16.

According to the latest available state government workforce reports, that would take the average SEIU employee's salary from $48,851 at present, to about $49,950.

Local 668 President Tom Herman called the agreement one that's "in the best interests of our employees," adding that negotiators performed admirably in a climate marked by an anticipated budget deficit and "heightened public scrutiny of the collective bargaining process."

Gov. Tom Wolf's Secretary of Administration Sharon Minnich, in turn, called the contract one that is "responsible to taxpayers and fair to employees."

Wolf's team and state labor leaders early on agreed to seek a series of one-year deals with the various unions whose contracts were set to expire at the end of the current fiscal year.

For the Wolf Administration, just finishing its first few months in office, it took a major administrative issue off the table as the governor is about to plunge into his first round of state budget negotiations with legislative leaders.

Union leaders, meanwhile, get to see how those same negotiations - with the possibility of significant new increases in state revenues as proposed by Wolf - play out before they lock themselves into a long-term agreement.

The administration said negotiations with a number of smaller unions whose contracts expire on June 30th are continuing, but they are expected to follow the framework of the AFSCME and SEIU deals in all major respects.

Source: PennLive