Did Right by Retirees

To the Editor:

The recently concluded contract between District Council 37 and the City of New York has great impact not only on the 121,000 working members of the union but also on the 50,000 retirees of the union. Not enough has been said about the direct impact of key contractual provisions on the retirees.

The contract provides that the city contribute more than $42 million in cash and rate increases to the union's Health and Security Fund, broken down in the following manner:

• Effective July 1, 2006, an additional permanent rate increase of $100 for each working and retired member;
• Effective Nov. 1, 2006, a lump sum payment of $166.67 for each working and retired member.

This funding came directly from the working members who extended the length of the contract to provide the cash and rate increase for all 171,000 members, including retirees, covered by the Health and Security Fund. The Health and Security Fund provides, among other things, our Welfare Fund Benefits, which include prescription drugs, dental and optical services, legal services and audiology benefits for New York City residents.

We all know that the cost of any health-related benefit that includes prescription drugs, dental and optical services is skyrocketing every year.

In order to finance the continuation of our current benefits to working and retired members, the Health and Security Plan required more money. If the contract would not have provided increased funding, then we the members would have been faced with greater out-of-pocket costs and a reduction of benefits, or both.

Because the contract provided nearly 10 percent in salary increases, working members could more easily absorb increased out-of-pocket payments for prescription drugs or optical benefits than retirees, who are on fixed incomes and receive no offsetting increases to finance increased out-of-pocket expenses.

The president of the DC 37 Retirees' Association (myself) is a vice president of District Council 37, a member of the executive board and a member of the collective-bargaining committee of the union. We were very forceful in all these settings to demand that the union receive more health and security resources for working members and retirees.

To the everlasting credit of the entire bargaining committee and the District Council 37 Delegate Body, the union voted to support these additional sums of money to go not only to the active members but also to the retirees.

Obviously, every working member hopes to live to become a retiree! But, not all unions include negotiated benefits for their retirees. Often, retirees are "out-ofsight, out-of-mind." Also, in many cases retirees do not vote on the contracts negotiated by their unions.

We are proud of our DC 37 brothers and sisters voting to finance increases for retirees. We will continue to be vigorous when it comes to protecting our rights and interests.

STUART LEIBOWITZ, President, DC 37 Retirees' Association