Our Local  shrunk 25% from 2000 to 2006, yet our leader boasted about winning organizing awards.  In 2007, the local realized an additional 1,500 members largely due to the previous years' work by Tom Bruno to get Corrections Health Care back into State hands and the work he did collecting job descriptions and then interviewing those in managerial titles ("M" category employees) in an effort to get them into CWA.  without his efforts, the Local's membership would still be in mid- 6,000's.

The 3% wage increase in 2007 for state workers (which they were told would net them a little over 1% after the new deductions kicked in) actually led to a net loss of pay ($20-$35 each pay) for them!

State workers were told that the State was broke and that is why they had to accept the health care and pension give backs, yet the Governor’s own budget-in-brief, released on 2/21/07, showed a $1.9 BILLION surplus from Fiscal Year 2008 on page 58!  In FY 2009, the same story, except the surplus was initially projected to be $2.5 Billion, but after the economic collapse, the adjusted surplus was actually $1.3 Billion and still Carolyn Wade was telling everyone the state was broke! 

And Wade continued rushing to the defense of the Governor trying to convince us that the surplus was proof that the State was broke.  During the height of the  economic collapse, while we were still suffering through an 18 month wage freeze and a 4% cut in pay affectionally called "furloughs," the state was enjoying over a half billion dollar surplus in both the 2010 and the 2011 budgets (page 60 of the Budget in Brief).

When one of our own members, Executive Board member, and former staff representative, Tom Bruno, ran for the State Pension Board to help protect state worker pensions, our president, Carolyn Wade, and executive vice president, Don Klein, tried to blackball him with the AFLCIO and refused to endorse him.  92,000 ballots went out to state workers all over the state and without a single word of support from our Local leadership or the AFLCIO, he won with 55% of the vote.  Did we even get to read about this dramatic victory for our members in the Viewpoint???  Of course not!   But everyone else got to see how our leadership let their personal feelings get in the way of taking care of our members!  http://politickernj.com/upset-pers-election-9077

Then Tom ran again in 2010.  This time, when an Executive Board member tried to motion for an endorsement, Carolyn Wade refused to allow the motion to go forward even though Robert's Rules of Order are clear about "Good of the Order" motions ALWAYS being in order!  Tom has voted to protect our Pensions at every opportunity.  When the Actuary's utilization report was made, it was Tom Bruno that motioned to send a letter to then Governor Corzine condemning his decision to not fund the system and the financial impact of that decision!  And then it was Tom Bruno who, along with his fellow PERS Trustees Pete Mauer and John Lowden, successfully tried to stop the recent Pension bills from being passed in the Assembly the same week the Senate passed their versions.  While the bills ultimately passed, the Legislature received a letter from the PERS Board explaining to them that they should hear from our actuary before making any decision and, as a result, some of the more detrimental provisions of the bills were taken out by the Assembly.

We have lost our political clout in New Jersey politics. Our Local leadership was able to get Speaker of the Assembly, Sheila Oliver to our 2009 Convention claiming that she was our "friend."   That "friend" was the prime sponsor of ALL of the Assembly versions of the Pension Bills, and she pushed them through and allowed the Governor the limelight of signing the death warrant for the Public Employees' Retirement System as we know it!  With friends like her, who needs enemies?!!

There was a time, in the not-so-distant past, when Governors and Legislators would ASK for our input BEFORE they made plans to injure our members.  Now they are simply TELLING us what they have decided to do. 

Governor Corzine created a task force to review State Worker benefits in 2006, yet not one Local 1040 representative was on that task force to advocate for the members.  Not one request from our Local leadership was made to the members to lobby for our inclusion.  In short, our Local leaders were asleep behind the wheel while special interests and big money executives carved up state worker benefits.  And they're not done with us yet.  In a report that was completed on September 5, 2007 but not released until three days after the elections, the Government Efficiency and Reform Commission's Health Care Task Force Report recommended that state workers pay even more than the 1.5% of their salary now required.  Governor Christie AND our "friends in the Legislature agreed and have decimated our health care and pension benefits while simultaneously stripping us of our right to bargain these changes at the negotiations table!
As the FY08, FY09, FY10, FY 2011 and FY 2012 budget bills rolled through the Assembly and the Senate, not one person from Local 1040 leadership testified on it, unless you count Tom Bruno who did it as a private citizen and stateworker.   His testimony for FY 2011 can be found here:

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/legislativepub/budget_2011/032510/Bruno_T.pdf

Prior years testimony can be viewed here:

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/legislativepub/budget2008/Testimony/03132007/Bruno_T.pdf

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/legislativepub/budget%202009/032508/Bruno_T.pdf

Our leaders never asked for more money for our brothers and sisters working in group homes.  Not a word was said about property taxes which directly impact on our brothers and sisters in county and municipal government.  Nothing was said to straighten the record out about public workers not being the problem.  And the only thing our Local leaders did for public workers was to remain silent for the past four years. 

A bill to close 5 institutions was introduced and 3 public hearings were held all over the state, yet not one person from our Local was there to comment on it.  This had the potential to shrink our Union by another 2,500 members.  Our Leadership has been less than visible on this issue.  Now we are facing the closure of Hagedorn Psychiatric Hospital in 10 months and the remaining half of VIneland Develeopmental Center in June 2013 (the first half was closed in June 2011 without a word from our leader, Carolyn Wade). 

Do you think these politicians would try this if we had the same clout as we did when Fran Fiore and Tom Bruno ran
 Local 1040's political arm?!

We deserve more than silence.  We deserve more than lies.

We deserve more than a president who is more concerned about hiring her friends and relatives (in positions with huge salaries that are not even authorized by our by-laws or our Executive Board), than in trying to keep excellent staff.

And that is why we need a change, and why this website has been created! 

In the Fall of 2011, the Local will have elections for new leaders.  It's time to vote for a change...

It's time to VOTE FOR TOM BRUNO
LOCAL 1040 PRESIDENT!