PAGE 6 | August 16, 2019 | NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
RETIREMENT
Public employees file lawsuit to protect PERS retirement benefits
Plaintiffs say SB 1049 is a breach
of contract, an illegal taking, and
violates the Constitution.
Nine Oregon public employees
filed a lawsuit in the State
Supreme court Aug. 9 challeng-
ing the constitutionality of a bill
passed by the Legislature that
negatively impacts their retire-
ment benefits.
In the last session of the Leg-
islature, lawmakers passed Sen-
ate Bill 1049, which cut benefits
to current employees in the Pub-
lic Employee Retirement Sys-
tem (PERS). Both the House
and Senate were controlled by
Democrats, and the bill was
signed by Gov. Kate Brown, a
Democrat.
The lawsuit contends that the
bill targeted working people by
taking money out of personal
accounts to pay employer’s pen-
sion obligations to retirees. The
plaintiffs assert that the loss of
retirement benefits violates both
state and federal constitutions, is
a breach of contract, and is an il-
legal taking without compensa-
tion.
Jennifer James is the lead
plaintiff in James v. the State of
Oregon, et al. A member of Ore-
gon School Employees Associa-
tion, James has worked as a sec-
retary at Molalla River School
District for 19 years. After nearly
two decades of service, she earns
less than $40,000 a year in
salary. She is counting on every
penny of her PERS for retire-
ment security. According to the
court filing, SB 1049 reduces her
individual retirement account by
more than 13%.
“I love my school district and
COLLECTIVE BARGAINING
USW members ratify new
contract at Cascade Steel
Wages will rise 3.25% a year
for the 280 steel workers at the
McMinnville mill.
A month after members of
United Steelworkers Local
8378 authorized a strike, pub-
licly traded Schnitzer Steel im-
proved its contract offer in a
three-day last ditch round of
negotiations that involved a
federal mediator. The resulting
three-year agreement— rati-
fied by members Aug. 9—will
raise wages 3.25% annually
for the 280 workers at
Schnitzer’s McMinnville steel
mill complex, known as Cas-
cade Steel Rolling Mills.
“That wasn’t quite what we
hoped for on wages,” Local
8378 President Jim Blue told
the Labor Press. Union nego-
tiators had hoped to get 3.5
percent.
Because the agreement also
contained concessions, the
union bargaining didn’t rec-
ommend either passage or re-
jection. The agreement was
approved with support of 61%
of those voting.
“It was three hard days with
the mediators,” said Blue.
“Some of the members in the
[bargaining] committee were
not happy, but it’s better than
contracts we’ve been getting.”
The first pay increase is im-
mediate, and will be retroac-
tive to the April 1 expiration of
the previous agreement. That
raise comes on top of a 60-cent
per hour across-the-board
wage increase that workers got
in return for agreeing to end
production bonuses. Produc-
tion bonuses used to be sub-
stantial, but a new formula in
the 2016-2019 contract re-
duced them from thousands of
dollars a year to just hundreds.
The biggest concession is an
agreement that workers will
pay more for insurance. Each
year of the contract workers
will pay an additional 1% of
the premium. The contract sets
a worker contribution target of
15% or 20%, depending on
which plan workers choose.
The union also agreed to
transition to a company-spon-
sored dental plan, but the com-
pany improved on its previous
offer, agreeing to cover $2,500
a year of dental work, the same
as workers now get.
The company rejected
union proposals to make Vet-
erans Day a paid holiday for
veterans and to lengthen paid
bereavement leave to five
days.
The new agreement runs
through March 30, 2022.
“Their service for public
employers creates cer-
tain contract rights to
retirement benefits. As
the Oregon Supreme
Court has ruled in the
past, the State cannot
breach the terms of
those contractual
promises.”
— Aruna Masih,
PERS Coalition attorney
have been faithfully doing my
job for nearly 20 years with the
promise of a secure retirement,”
James said. “Now that promise
has been broken. SB 1049 is un-
just, unconstitutional, and
should be overturned by the
court. The idea of a poverty-
level retirement benefit is terri-
fying to me.”
Other plaintiffs listed in the
filing are Salem firefighter Bran-
don Silence, a member of the
Oregon State Firefighters Coun-
cil; Lisa Riegel, a member of
Oregon Education Association
employed at Mt. Hood Commu-
nity College; Roseanne Scott, a
member of Service Employees
International Union Local 503
who works for the Oregon De-
partment of Human Services;
Robert Martineau, a City of
Portland employee and member
of AFSCME Local 189; Regina
Thompson, a member of Asso-
ciation of Engineering Employ-
ees of Oregon employed at the
Oregon Depart- ment of Trans-
portation; Emily Marx, a nurse
for Multnomah County and
member of Oregon Nurses Asso-
ciation (ONA); Dustin Andrews,
a nurse at Oregon Health and
Science University and member
of ONA; and Thomas Cleary, a
member of the Multnomah
County Prosecuting Attorney’s
Association employed at Mult-
nomah County.
“The plaintiffs and all PERS
members accepted a job in good
faith for a salary and benefits
package, did the work they
promised to do, and planned
their futures based on the pack-
age they agreed to accept,” said
Aruna Masih, lead attorney on
the case for Bennett Hartman,
Attorneys at Law LLP, the same
firm that won billions of dollars
in restored benefits by challeng-
ing similar cuts before the Ore-
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