Election results pack a message for unions, Branstad says

Gov. Terry Branstad said Thursday he is hopeful that Iowa labor unions will take a message from vote outcomes this week in Wisconsin and California -- that taxpayers expect a reasonable approach to public-sector benefits in softening their opposition to state employees paying a larger share of their health insurance costs.

Branstad pointed to election results in California, where residents of San Diego and San Jose voted overwhelmingly to cut the pension benefits they give city workers, and in Wisconsin, where Gov. Scott Walker brushed back a recall attempt by critics of his move to strip most public-sector unions of their collective bargaining rights, as evidence of taxpayer dissatisfaction with the level of benefits being provided to government workers.

“It tells me that it's not easy, but if you're going to manage and control the cost of government you've got to rein in the excesses of these public employee benefits,” the governor said.

The most-glaring excess in Iowa's public employment compensation package, Branstad said, is a provision of collective bargaining agreement with unionized state employees that allows some workers to receive health insurance coverage without paying a share of the premium costs. State Department of Administrative Services officials have indicated that 88 percent of the nearly 28,000 employees in Iowa's executive branch do not pay anything toward their premiums.

However, rather than push for changes in Iowa's collective bargaining law, the GOP governor is offering an olive branch to state employee unions who he has been at odds with in the past by calling on the two sides to work together to reach a compromise.

Branstad has – without success -- called on state employees' union to reopen the current two-year contract that runs through June 30, 2013, and renegotiate a benefits package that would have state workers paying 20 percent of their health insurance costs. But he said Thursday he is not giving up on the idea and believes this week's election response from taxpayers back up his position.

“We want to work with the unions to work something reasonable out,” Branstad said in an interview.

“I ran on and was elected on state employees should pay 20 percent of their health care costs. I believe that should be done, but I think that should be done through the bargaining process and I intend to work in good faith with the unions to accomplish that. Hopefully, they can see that most people pay a lot more than 20 percent,” he added. “This is a very modest proposal.

“If you have something that's reasonable -- and that's reasonable -- then it's something that you ought to agree to, and you ought not to be so partisan to say: “By God we got this and we're never going to give it up.” That doesn't make any sense, especially when the taxpayers that are paying the bills are paying a lot more than that.”

Danny Homan, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) Council 61 – the largest state employees union in Iowa – said it was not appropriate under Iowa's collective bargaining law for him to discuss contract proposals or anything to do with the bargaining process. “Terry Branstad ought to be bargaining with us in good faith at the bargaining table and not in the press,” he said.

Republicans who held a 60-40 majority in the Iowa House during both sessions of the 84th General Assembly said the state could save nearly $43 million by requiring all state employees and elected officials to contribute $200 per month to their health-insurance coverage.

During the 2011 session the GOP-led Iowa House passed a contentious collective bargaining reform bill on a party-line 56-39 vote, but the issue stalled in the Iowa Senate where Democrats hold a 26-24 advantage heading into the 2012 legislative campaign. The issue could resurface in the Legislature next year if Republicans succeed in winning control of the Senate, House and governorship in Iowa.