If you think the state’s legal battle with the Hawaii State Teachers Association is intense, wait until negotiations boil over with the United Public Workers, which represents more than 13,000 state and county blue-collar workers. Talks with the UPW have produced little apparent progress since the old “Furlough Friday” contract expired July 1, and while [...]
Posted tagged ‘labor unions’
Are UPW talks coming to a head?
September 16, 2011HSTA can’t get its affidavits straight
September 9, 2011The Hawaii State Teachers Association has received a stinging rebuke from the Hawaii State Labor Relations Board in its prohibited practices case against the state for implementing its “last, best and final” contract offer. In July, HSTA filed an amended motion for interlocutory relief and tried to strike the state’s declarations of opposition on the [...]
New twists in teachers contract dispute
August 18, 2011The state Ethics Commission is likely to take more flak from high places for its advisory ruling that led Sesnita Moepono, one of three members of the Hawaii Labor Relations Board, to withdraw from the prohibited practices case involving the Hawaii State Teachers Association contract. The ethics determination was pretty much a no-brainer; Moepono’s husband [...]
HSTA flounders in labor battle
August 17, 2011The Hawaii State Teachers Association is making self-defeating moves in its legal fight to overturn a state-imposed contract that hits teachers with a 5-percent pay cut and a greater share of medical premiums. The HSTA’s complaint to the state Ethics Commission that Gov. Neil Abercrombie and the Department of Education engaged in illegal ex parte [...]
New hope in teachers’ labor dispute, or just hype?
August 8, 2011It could be naive, but I’m going to take the offer of the Hawaii State Teachers Association to enter into mediation with the state in their continuing contract dispute as a sign of progress and not more posturing. The teachers union is currently pursuing legal action against the state after Gov. Neil Abercrombie and schools Superintendent [...]
Teachers play political card in contract dispute
July 28, 2011The latest plea by the Hawaii State Teachers Association to get Gov. Neil Abercrombie back to the bargaining table seems more intended to step up political pressure on Abercrombie than to actually restart negotiations. In a letter to Abercrombie, HSTA president Wil Okabe made blatant reference to the union’s campaign endorsement of Abercrombie and said, [...]
Give the kids a place at the table in school contract talks
July 6, 2011It’s disappointing that the stalled contract negotiations between the state and public school teachers appear to be focused entirely on pay and benefits, with little discussion of promised reforms to improve student learning. After the furlough Fridays fiasco, the Legislature tried to mollify angry parents with new laws requiring a minimum of 180 instruction days [...]
Will the HGEA contract set the standard?
April 7, 2011It’s hard to say for sure without seeing the fine print, but the tentative agreement between the state and the Hawaii Government Employees Association announced yesterday by Gov. Neil Abercrombie seems a fair contribution by state and county workers toward reducing the state’s $1.3 billion deficit. Basically, the 28,000 active white-collar workers represented by HGEA [...]
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