President’s Report
January 8, 2020
Happy & Healthy New Year everyone
F.P.I – Equality Litigation – We are currently working with the Firm of Mehri & Skalet PLLC and Professor Wilson regarding the pay disparity issue our FPI are facing. We are in the exploration phase. We’re looking to hold a joint meeting between the union, attorneys and Professor Wilson sometime in the next 2 to 3 weeks. We will keep you posted.
F.P.I – Our talks with the FDNY to include our Fire inspectors in its publications has been successful.
In recent months we have seen our FPI members in numerous dept videos on social media postings and publications. The union for the first time aired a commercial acknowledging and thanking our men and women in Fire Prevention on 1010 wins radio. We’re proud of the men and women the keep our city safe.
Albany – The session season has begun; in the coming weeks we will be introducing legislation to improve our health and pension benefits. As you’re aware, things in Albany are a bit rocky with all the reforms that have recently passed impacting us statewide. With that being said, we will need some members participation to come up to Albany with us during lobbying day. We will post more in-depth information as the bills get introduced.
Assaults – Bail reform and its unintended consequences. As you are aware, the new laws regarding bail reform has already shown to be impacting innocent people across the state, specifically those in public service. We are hopeful that the state legislators will correct the statue, protecting public service employees that risk their life daily.
AWS – Today we have reached a tentative agreement with the dept. and the city. We are going to see some changes in station units and a minor expansion to other stations not in the program. Some of the changes will be converting 12-hour units back to 8-hour shifts and converting other 16-hour units within the same station to 12-hour tours, the changes will be for BLS units only. No Changes to ALS trucks that are currently on 12s. We understand that this will cause some hardship to some members, there will be some growing pain with these changes, it was the only way to keep the program going with no change in sick leave or kvo policy.The dept was looking for mandatory kvo’s, the city was looking for a harsher sick leave policy. We were able to avoid that at this time, but we are certain it will come back to the table during negotiations as we went from 20 thousand sick calls in year ending 2018 to 34 thousand year ending 2019. The changes were originally intended to take place back in November 2019, but with all the raising issues it kept getting pushed back, we’re anticipating the changes to take place in March of 2020.
The change in units and added stations will be released shortly.
Contract – We are now awaiting a date to begin the process of negotiations with the city.
We have a lot of work ahead of us, with many issues to address, this is a lengthy process, and with your cooperation and participation we will get this done. We hope to get a date with the city in the coming days.
FLSA – December 23, 2019 the Court found that the EMTs and Paramedics were entitled to liquidated damages (or double damages). The Court is not going to issue final judgment, or hold the settlement conference for the Fire Inspectors, until after the issue of attorneys’ fees is decided. According to the attached decision, by January 22, 2020, we need to tell the court one of two things: either that the parties either agree on the amount of fees and expenses (and if so, how much is owed) or, if the parties disagree, a briefing schedule so that the Court can decide the issue. Once the fees and expenses are resolved the Court will enter final judgment (inclusive of fees and expenses) and hold the settlement approval conference for the Fire Inspectors. Right now, not including fees, the City owes $14,477,026.
It’s still unknown if the city is planning to appeal.
Stay safe and look out for each other.
Oren Barzilay
President
FDNY EMS Local 2507