More than $1 million is Kaua’i’s share of a two-year agreement brokered by Governor Ben Cayetano and United Public Workers state director Gary Rodrigues that will give 8,700 state and county blue-collar workers an 11 percent pay increase. In going
More than $1 million is Kaua’i’s share of a two-year agreement brokered by Governor Ben Cayetano and United Public Workers state director Gary Rodrigues that will give 8,700 state and county blue-collar workers an 11 percent pay increase.
In going beyond its original offer of 9 percent, the state won UPW’s agreement to reduce the number of vacation and sick leave days given to newly hired employees.
The settlement agreement reached Tuesday is estimated by Kaua’i County officials to eventually cost the county approximately $1.1 million over the next two years.
In the fiscal year beginning July 1, 2001, the initial estimated cost to Kaua’i will be $86,000, which will be used to cover defined benefit plans for union members.
Approximately 320 (30 percent) of the county’s employees are UPW members.
Mayor Maryanne Kusaka had a positive response to the new contract.
“This agreement is certainly moving in the right direction, especially in the area of workplace drug policy,” Kusaka said.
County spokeswoman Beth Tokioka said the new contract reduces the three-strikes (three drug offenses and out of a job) clause to a two-strikes policy.
Cayetano thanked Rodrigues and the UPW leadership “for their openness in looking at the state’s financial condition and recognizing that the state has been bargaining in good faith. I think this contract sets a pattern and a tone for future negotiations with other (public employee) unions.” The state is still negotiating with Hawai`i State Teachers Association, Hawaii Government Employees Union and the University of Hawaii Professional Assembly.
The 11 percent pay hike for UPW employees will come in through four incremental raises over the next two years, at a total cost to state coffers of $22 million. That includes the $1.1 million on Kaua`i.
Although Cayetano claimed previously that 9 percent pay hikes were the most the state could afford, he said if the other unions in negotiations agreed to the 11 percent hike, the state would find the money.
All four county mayors signed off on the UPW agreement.
Tokioka said Kaua’i County officials don’t expect any problems with ratification by UPW members here.
Before the new agreement, UPW members in October overwhelmingly approved a strike authorization if a deal couldn’t be reached in the recently concluded negotiations.
Staff writer Dennis Wilken can be reached at 245-3681 (ext. 252) and dwilken@pulitzer.net The Associated Press contributed to this report.
