Remember the recent uproar over public employee unions in New Hampshire? The one about eliminating collective bargaining obligations when labor contracts end?
It was slipped into the House budget proposal, but the N.H. Senate has stripped the controversy from its version of the budget. And now, a Senate committee has reshaped House Bill 580, which also included a collective bargaining provision that organized labor strongly opposed.
House Bill 580
When it passed the House last month, HB 580 was one of a handful of comprehensive proposals this session to reform New Hampshire’s public pension system. Daily Briefing took notice of one particular provision in the original text of HB 580. Bear with us here — the legalese is followed by regular English. It said when a collective bargaining agreement has lapsed, or during negotiations:
“the status quo shall be maintained as to the wages, hours, and conditions of employment of employees in good standing. Except where required by statute, the continuation, after the expiration of the agreement, of the provision of any medical, dental, and life insurance benefits, retirement or pension benefits, and any other fringe benefits, shall be subject to the exclusive authority of the public employer.”
In other words, while employees and their wages would not revert to “at will” status when a contract ends, their benefits would.
Another clause would have allowed public employees to opt out of all “medical, dental and retirement benefits in order to instead receive an increase in his or her base salary or wage.”
With that kind of change in law, collective bargaining negotiations and group insurance calculations would become a whole new ball game.
They’ll look into it
So, the Senate Executive Departments and Administration Committee acted in the time-honored legislative tradition of dealing with radioactive issues by creating a study committee.
Actually, they replaced everything in the bill with a provision to create this collective bargaining study committee. As amended, HB 580 would have three Senate members and four members of the House study the issue of public sector collective bargaining agreements.Their report would be due by December 1.
The measure passed the committee by a unanimous 5-0 vote. The bill now heads to a full Senate vote Wednesday.
It ain’t over till it’s over
But this may not be the end of the story. House Bill 580 — the one that got turned into a study committee — was sponsored by Rep. Neal Kurk (R-Weare). He’s the same representative who inserted the “at will” measure into the House budget bill, which the House passed by a sizable 228-139 vote.
Any changes the Senate makes to both the budget and HB 580 will have to be approved by the House. Stay tuned.
This Daily Briefing was written by Michael McCord.
Should they study collective bargaining, leave it alone, or change it now?
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