AFSCME Legislative Report
AFSCME LEGISLATIVE REPORT
June 22, 2007
In this issue:
AFSCME Members Rally and Lobby for the Employee Free
Choice Act
On Tuesday, 2,000 AFSCME members and retirees
attending the Union's National Leadership Conference stormed Capitol
Hill to demand Senate passage of the Employee Free Choice Act
(EFCA). Joined by other union members and activists, the crowd of
nearly 4,000 cheered to expressions of support from House and Senate
leaders. After the rally, AFSCME members and retirees met with
Senators and their staff to urge passage of EFCA. AFSCME delegations
from Minnesota, Pennsylvania and Ohio visited Senate offices,
delivering thousands of postcards signed by AFSCME members in
support of EFCA.
In addition to EFCA, AFSCME members and retirees lobbied their
Senators and Representatives to support increased federal funding
for services provided by state and local governments and to stop the
large subsidies to private health plans. These growing subsidies
threaten the financial soundness of the Medicare program and soak up
general fund revenues that could be used to cover more low-income
children under the State Children's Health Insurance Program
(SCHIP).
(Barbara Coufal- bcoufal@afscme.org)
Senate Vote on the Employee Free Choice Act
(EFCA)
This week, the Senate began debate on the
Employee Free Choice Act. GOP leaders responded with a filibuster,
forcing supporters of EFCA to secure 60 votes in order to end the
filibuster and move to a vote on the bill. We expect the vote to end
the filibuster will take place on Tuesday, June 26.
(Marge
Allen- mallen@afscme.org)
Call Your Senators to Support the
Employee Free Choice Act
A majority of
the Senate supports the Employee Free Choice Act. But opponents are using a
procedural obstacle to require a super-majority of 60 votes. Call your
Senators today at 1-888- 460-0813 and urge them to vote for
the Employee Free Choice Act so
that workers can choose to join a union without being
intimidated by their employer.
Public Safety Collective Bargaining Bill
Advances
After nearly 10 years of lobbying, a new
Democratic majority in the House has finally allowed the Public
Safety Officers Employer-Employee Cooperation Act (H.R. 980) to be
successfully reported out of the House Education and Labor
Committee. The vote was nearly unanimous, 42 to 1. H.R. 980 requires
each state to provide for collective bargaining for public safety
officers. During the Committee's debate, Chairman George Miller
(D-CA) said that "officers who put their lives on the line everyday
to safeguard the public deserve to be able to sit down with
management and bargain over working conditions and
compensation." Supporters of the bill fended off amendments to
weaken it. Outnumbered, Rep. Mark Souder (R-IN) withdrew his
amendment to prohibit card check union recognition. The next step is
a vote on the floor of the House. With over 270 cosponsors, the bill
has a high likelihood of passage. AFSCME's efforts will then focus
on the Senate where introduction of the companion bill is imminent.
The bill covers police and corrections officers, firefighters and
emergency medical workers.
(Jayne Clancy- jclancy@afscme.org)
Senate Passes Head Start Reauthorization
On
June 19, the Senate passed the Head Start for School Readiness Act
(H.R. 1429), legislation to reauthorize Head Start. The House passed
its version on May 2, 2007. The Senate bill authorizes $7.3 billion
in funding for FY 2008–$400 million more than was provided this
year–to expand the Head Start program. The House bill contains a
similar funding increase. Both bills expand eligibility for
additional low-income children from 100 percent to 130 percent of
the federal poverty level. The Senate bill establishes new education
attainment goals (rather than requirements or penalties) for the
Head Start teaching workforce. These include all Head Start teachers
nationwide having an associate's degree in five years; half of all
teachers in each state having a bachelor's degree in six years; and
all Head Start assistant teachers having at least a child
development associate credential in five years. This differs from
the House bill, which requires that 50 percent of Head Start
teachers nationwide to have a bachelor's degree by 2013. Both bills
retain the cost of living adjustments contained in the current law,
and increase the portion of funds that must be directed towards
improving quality. Both the Senate and House bills terminate the use
of the National Reporting System, the controversial test required of
all four-year-olds enrolled in Head Start, and they both increase
the portion of funding that must be used for Early Head Start.
AFSCME and allies were successful in keeping two harmful
provisions out of both the Senate and House versions of Head Start
reauthorization. First, neither bill allows states to convert Head
Start into a block grant, which would have threatened the
comprehensive services provided to children and their families. And,
both houses of Congress rejected attempts to allow faith-based Head
Start programs to discriminate based on religion when hiring Head
Start workers. The bills will now go to a conference committee to
work out differences between the House and Senate versions.
(Fran Bernstein- fbernstein@afscme.org)
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Senate Committee Approves Labor, Health and Human
Services and Education Appropriations Bill
On June 21,
the Senate Appropriations Committee approved the FY 2008 spending
bill for the departments of Labor, Health and Human Services and
Education (HHS), the largest domestic spending bill. It contains $9
billion more in spending than President Bush proposed in his budget.
The bill contains modest additional federal funding for Head Start,
state unemployment and employment services, special education, and
the Community Services Block Grant. Programs slated for more
substantial increases include Community Health Centers (13.6
percent), nursing education (13.4 percent), child abuse programs
(12.6 percent), grants to schools with large low-income populations
(10 percent), and school improvement grants (300 percent). In a
major disappointment, the Committee flat-funded the Child Care and
Development Block Grant (CCDBG), which provides child care subsidies
for low-income families. Yearly-appropriated funding for the CCDBG
has not increased since 2001, and since then 150,000 children have
lost assistance. The House Labor, HHS and Education Appropriations
Subcommittee approved a $75 million increase for CCDBG.
The Senate bill also allows federally-funded research on stem
cell lines that were derived before June 15 of this year, including
a moratorium on competitive sourcing activities at the U.S.
Department of Labor (DOL) until 60 days after the Committee receives
a report from the Government Accountability Office on the DOL's use
of these activities. The bill further requires the Departments of
Labor, HHS, and Education to provide quarterly reports to the
Committee with information on all grants and contracts awarded for
over $100,000 that were not competitively bid. The full Senate is
expected to vote on its Labor, HHS and Education funding bill in
July. The full House Appropriations Committee has not yet scheduled
a vote on its bill. After both houses of Congress pass their bills,
they will go to conference to resolve differences in funding levels.
The final bill will go to President Bush, who has already vowed to
veto it.
(Fran Bernstein- fbernstein@afscme.org)
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Bush Nominates Nussle to Head Office of Management and
Budget
In a move calculated to increase partisanship in
the federal budget process, President Bush nominated former House
Budget Chairman Jim Nussle (R-IA, 1991-2007) to be the new head of
the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB). When he
chaired the House Budget Committee, Nussle aggressively pushed
through Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy in 2001 and 2003, and
opposed adequate federal funding for vital domestic programs. If
confirmed by the Senate, Nussle will replace Rob Portman, who
announced he will be leaving the job to return to Ohio. The shift in
leadership at OMB comes at the same time that the President is
threatening vetoes of FY 2008 appropriations bills because the
congressional budget resolution allows an additional $23 billion in
spending over the President's budget for domestic programs that
receive annual funding. Senate Budget Chairman Kent Conrad (D-ND)
predicts strong opposition to Nussle's confirmation.
(Fran
Bernstein- fbernstein@afscme.org)
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National Online/Phone Presentation Addressing Threats to
Child Support Enforcement Funding
On Tuesday, June 26 at
2:00 p.m. EST, national experts both on and off Capitol Hill will be
speaking about the imminent threat to billion of dollars in federal
support to state and county child support enforcement (CSE)
programs. The Deficit Reduction Act of 2005 ended the federal match
on incentive payments to states. The Congressional Budget Office
estimates that states' CSE programs will lose $6.7 billion over 10
years, and that $11 billion in support owed to children will go
uncollected. The cuts are scheduled to take effect in October.
You can participate by phone or, on-line, where you can both see
and hear the presentations. You can access this discussion by
registering at: http://www.bostonconferencing.com/ncsea/1.
You will then receive participation instructions.
(Fran
Bernstein- fbernstein@afscme.org)
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Higher Ed Bills Move in the Senate
The Senate
Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee (HELP) approved two
bills intended to boost financial aid for college students while
requiring student lenders and university financial aid offices to
change the way they do business. The Committee approved the Higher
Education Act (S. 1642), which governs financial aid programs by a
20 to 0 vote. The Higher Education Access Reconciliation Act,
approved 17 to 3, would cut student lender subsidies by more than
$18 billion, devoting the savings to grant aid and loan relief for
students and to deficit reduction. The bill would make funding for
Pell grants an entitlement, not subject to the annual appropriations
process. It also would boost the maximum Pell grant by more than
$1,000, to $5,400 by 2011. A new "Promise" grant for the neediest
Pell recipients is created and student loan repayments are capped at
15 percent of discretionary income. In addition, first responders,
law enforcement officers, firefighters, nurses, public defenders,
prosecutors, early childhood educations would receive loan
forgiveness of $5,000 and complete loan forgiveness for public
sector employees after 10 years of service.
(Marge Allen- mallen@afscme.org)
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AFSCME Department of Legislation
Phone:
202/429-5020 or 800/732-8120
Fax: 202/223-3413
E-mail:
legislation@afscme.org
Website:
http://www.afscme.org/
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