HB 1411

When the NEA and NEA-NH push hard for a bill, I get suspicious.  HB 1411 is just such a bill.  It came up on my radar when an NEA email appeared in my wife's in box with all those "hey we really need to you to read this email" attention getters.  "VOTE ON TUESDAY," is the subject line and I'm thinking, vote on Tuesday?  What vote is on Tuesday?

HB1411 is described by the NEA like this...

It requires school districts to notify their ESP employees on or before the last day of school, each year, whether or not that employee will or will not have a job the next school year. That is all the bill does.

They go on to point out that some districts do this already under collective bargaining agreements.  That means the union makes them do it.  So the union would like to make sure anyone not under an agreement, or anyone who does not have this agreement gets it.  But why is that a potential problem?

For the answer we consult the NH House Republican Pink sheet which says

This bill would limit the flexibility of school districts by guaranteeing employment of support personnel prior to the school districts workload analysis of the coming school year. These are tax dollars and should not be earmarked to guarantee public employment in advance of the determination that public service is needed.

So the union is asking teachers to email and call State Senators to vote for HB 1411 to lock in taxpayer money in the name of 'fairness' for the 'lowest paid employees,' which sounds warm and fuzzy, but coming from the NEA makes my blood run cold. 

During these hard times people should know as soon as possible whether they have a job.

Just like you or I, who could get fired tomorrow without notice?  No. Like you or I who can't take a job over the summer to supplement our income?  No, these are educational staff.  They help teach our children!  They are special.  They have to know.

No, actually , they don't. 

But I'm picturing future contracts with unions getting their hand on these folks and etching the provisions in stone across the state in places that cannot possibly afford to promise money to people they may not be able to afford come September.

Maybe I can make it clearer.  Think lawsuits.  Think taxpayer funded lawsuits as your town defends itself for having to fire low wage school employees, it in good faith either do not need or cannot afford but that by law had to promise a job before they really knew if they needed it.  So do they keep people at your expense they can't afford, or fire them just in case?  And what happens when they need them back and hire someone else?

And while the proponents are promising that this bill is harmless, this just complicates the problem already created by the lamprey/vampire like relationship between taxpayers and their municipalities and public sector unions.  Why in the name of all that makes sense do we have public sector unions?

I'd like to see a few bills next session that break up public sector union power and make it easier for towns to dump their unions.  An outright repeal would make me happy.  No offense to the people employed with them, all good folks for the most part, but the pension problems and protected wage growth--which always exceeds private sector averages--is unsustainable and operates outside price and cost pressures.  There are hundreds of reasons why public sector unions are a bad idea, but here's just one more.  Unemployment.  When there is no money, as in NO MONEY, the union will cut you loose to protect their contracts and power.  They don't care about workers, just the union. And when you go to collect a pension there is no money for, what do you do, file a lawsuit that will cost more money they already don't have?

So on Tuesday I suspect the liberal meat puppets in the State Senate will pass this 'seemingly harmless' bill, taking more choices and power away from towns and cities and giving it to unions and lawyers.  And we should not be surprised if they do.  It has been the hallmark of the past few years of democrat rule in New Hampshire, a tenure that cannot come to an end soon enough.