Fix Retiree Benefits

We need to get back to our roots...

We are retired but not asleep. As such, we need to stand up to Michael Mulgrew and Unity in clear and unambiguous terms. Clearly Unity could not care less about our resolutions. If they respected us at all, they wouldn’t be lobbying against 1096, which would protect Medicare and eliminate co-pays that are driving some retired members into penury.

We need leadership that will speak truth to Unity. We need leadership that will muster the means to communicate with us about all things, not just those approved by Michael Mulgrew and his army of overcompensated sycophants. We need a leadership that will not only take a firm stand on 1096, but also actively work for its passage. I’m pretty happy teaching part-time and playing the fiddle on days off, but I will run for RCT chapter leader in 2027 if we don’t find a way to make that happen.

It was an error for us to compromise and endorse a resolution that health care decisions be approved by the DA. Not only would we have been better off with James Eterno’s original vision of full membership approval, but we also enabled Unity to set up a puppet health care committee. Of course they voted up a plan they were not allowed to see. Unity told them it was fine, and the overwhelming majority would’ve lost their cozy gigs and offices if they asked too many questions (let alone voted no).

What are people thinking when they vote for an important contract they aren’t allowed to read?

It’s nice that Unity paid valuable lip service to our COLA in 2024. It was also nice when they did so in 2007. However, I’ve not heard a whisper about it since. We need to hold their well-compensated feet to the fire on that and other issues.

Don’t get me wrong—I have no issue with the work that Retiree Advocate has taken on. If they want to support labor, that’s great. I support labor as well, and so should we all. If members want to work on other causes, we can resolve to do so. I joined the demonstration against ICE a few weeks back. That said, we can’t forget why we were elected.

That’s why it’s time to revive a movement—the very movement with which we began. Almost two years ago, we opposed Unity, we opposed Michael Mulgrew, and we opposed their attempts to dump retirees into an inferior Medicare Advantage plan. We overwhelmingly defeated them.

Since then, we’ve become disorganized. We’ve failed to keep our eye on the ball. And Unity has rallied, with cries of, “Look at this, not that.” They’ve tried, very hard, to vilify our allies, Marianne Pizzitola and NYC Retirees. Even though this org managed to preserve Medicare for us, and mightily helped us to defeat Unity, they’ve labeled the org a “business” rather than a movement, thus dismissing it—and us as well.

We rose from nothing. We kept our eyes open. Even as Mulgrew and Unity declared Medicare Advantage was as good or better than real Medicare, they sent retired VPs to the City Council to declare it was not good enough for them. They, therefore, needed the option of paying more to keep it. Never mind that a whole lot of retired members would not be able to afford this additional expense.

If Medicare Advantage is not good enough for the Unity Elite, it’s not good enough for lowly members like you and me either.

Unity will tell us it’s no longer necessary for us to fight, yet another variation on their long-standing directive to membership—Sit down and shut up. They’ll say with Mamdani as mayor, we’re in no danger of Medicare Advantage. They’ll disregard Mamdani’s other broken campaign pledges, like dumping mayoral control, and expect us to forget that it was Mulgrew and Unity who put us in danger in the first place.

We need to stop relying on Unity to protect us. Why?

There are several conclusions you can reach from this. One that’s inescapable is that UFT-endorsed City Council Speaker Menin thinks we spend too much on public sector and retiree health care. An obvious remedy is to spend less, and one way the city thinks it can save gazillions is via dumping us into Medicare Advantage. You’d be a fool to simply rule it out, or depend on mealy-mouthed Mulgrew to preclude it.

Even if that does not happen, “renegotiating hospital rates” could very likely mean further tiering, and higher co-pays for both in-service and retiree members. The new health plan, the one they forced everyone to vote upon without reading, is likely as not to be full of surprises. Were it not, they wouldn’t have needed to keep it top secret.

Furthermore, this would not preclude their imposing higher co-pays on those of us with Medicare either. UFT Unity sees retirees as a veritable piggy bank. Hey, let’s impose co-pays on absolutely everything! Hey, let’s double the cost of SHIP! Hey, so what if other unions don’t make retirees pay for pharmacy insurance? You know what? Let’s not only charge ours, but let’s raise the rates by a factor of 50% over just two years!

That’s absolutely unacceptable. If DC37, police, firefighters and sanitation Welfare Funds can pay for prescription insurance, UFT Welfare Fund can do it too. Please sign out petition and tell them so.

Unity thinks retirees are a big joke. They ridicule us at the DA. When caught, they not only fail to censure their bigoted, overpaid patronage recipient, but allow him to make lame ass excuses and applaud him for them. Amy Arundell’s a retiree, and they allow their members to create the most vulgar, misogynist images of her with no repercussions whatsoever.

It’s time for us to to stand up. It’s time for us to follow through with our conviction to protect ourselves. We don’t work for Michael Mulgrew. In fact, we pay him to work for us. Our leadership must demand that our representatives represent us. I’m ready to do that.

Will you stand with me?