We Stand With NYC Retirees...

in Albany yesterday--and wherever we need to go tomorrow.

It’s been an interesting week. I was on the radio with Marianne Pizzitola on Monday, and if you missed it (I know I did.), you can download the episode right here and give a listen. Marianne told me we’d be meeting on Zoom, so I shaved. It turns out, though, that no one can tell whether or not you’d shaved on the radio.

Should we perhaps regret our choice of vocation? Had we chosen to be radio hosts, we could have gone to work in our pajamas. (Or someone else’s pajamas, if we saw fit.) We could still be wearing them now, in fact.

On Tuesday, I left my Freeport home at 6:30 AM to go to Albany. I had to stop in the Bronx to pick up Gale Lindenberg and Susan Herzog. At 5:30 AM I’d checked my GPS program and it was a 55 minute drive. By 6:30, it had become a 90 minute drive. The gosh darn Bronx and the five gazillion people who want to drive through it. Still, for me, it beat taking the bus. Buses and I don’t mix well.

It was fun taking a trip with my fellow retiree activists. We ran into Laura Genovese and Michael Broucum there. That was at least 5 ABC members represented. We counted the caucus folks as well. We saw zero Unity members and zero Retiree Advocate members there. (While I haven’t got my calculator handy, altogether, there weren’t many of them.)

Several retirees gave stirring speeches, including Laura Genovese. One was 93 years old. She spoke forcefully of how Medicare Advantage would have stripped her of vital coverage. Being active keeps you young, and that’s why you need to come with us next time!

We made our presence known. The walls shook as we chanted, and the Senators were on the other side of that wall. And it was no mean feat shaking those walls—that building looks like frigging Hogwarts.

The state bill they are floating is a little different than the last one. It’s called HERA right now and they tell me it now focuses on larger municipalities, like NYC. It would, though, guarantee real Medicare for us and eliminate Mulgrew’s odious co-pays.

I don’t know about you, but I gave 39 full-time years to New York City. I taught kids from all over the world. It was gratifying. These kids gave to me as I gave to them. This notwithstanding, I was acutely aware that just a few miles east of where I was working, teachers with the same experience and qualifications were getting 20K more than I was.

I never begrudged Long Island teachers. They deserved what they got. And I loved teaching in New York City. I grew up in Long Island, but was always proud to serve NYC kids. I felt like they needed me, especially when I finally started teaching ENL. For years I also taught nights at Queens College. The money was good, the work was rewarding, but I was acutely aware public school kids needed me more.

Regardless, there was a deal we’d struck, and we all knew it. NYC was going to cover our medical 100%, with real Medicare, and no more co-pays. My friends who’d made all those tens of thousands more than I did, more than you did, were going to have to pay more for health care than we would. They got paid more upfront, but the city was going to take better care of us later on.

Until, of course, with the full aid and cooperation of Michael Mulgrew, the city reneged. Mulgrew sold us out to procure crappy contracts for which he should rightfully have given back nothing. Givebacks for raises that failed to meet cost of living are simply insane. They’re even worse when you sell out retirees, who have neither voice nor vote in collective bargaining. Mulgrew and his Very Smart People may well be the worst negotiators on God’s green earth.

Mulgrew and his overpaid cronies talk a big ballgame, and muster the audacity to go out there and peddle us health plans we aren’t allowed to see. Only after we vote for them are we allowed to know Unity’s selling our private health info to companies that care about profit well above human health (and who knows what else).

Do what we pay you for, we tell Mulgrew. Do as I say, he tells us back, and accuses anyone who contradicts him of misinformation. Trump isn’t the only one whose picture we should be carrying at the next No Kings rally.

While Mulgrew sat at 52 Broadway doing Whatever It Is we pay him hundreds of thousands of dollars to do, while his Unity ducklings went to gala luncheons on our dime, we were out in Albany, able to reach out to a whole lot of Senators and Assemblypersons. We met them in the halls, and others came out to address our group. I’m really glad we were able to participate.

We’re going to have to do this again, in Albany, at City Hall, and wherever Michael Mulgrew sends his disingenuous ducklings to work against our stated interests. He’s got some damn gall coming to our meetings, claiming he supports us, and then working against us.

He’s not fooling me, and he’s not fooling you either. We have to work for ourselves.

We will do this again, soon, and I hope to see you there when we do!