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Issue 2 Debate...
I’m weary, too
From Bob Rhoades
I as you, am weary of the SB 5/Issue adds. I’m wondering though
if you considered how many nurses actually work for a state run
hospital. First there are all of the University Hospitals in
Ohio, OSU, Toledo, UC, Wright State Med Center, as well as all of the
Mental Facilities in Ohio. Just sayin!
I know how busy you are, but there is a letter that a School
Superintendent here in Ohio wrote to his teachers and staff that pretty
well backs me up and actually gives a very good look into what has been
going on. Find it here, there will be no doubt in your mind when
you finish reading it...
Plunderbund...
Kasich on public
employees: “we are at war with these people”
By Joseph On September 19, 2011
About a week ago I was forwarded an email written by Dr. Mike
Shreffler, the Superintendent of Southeast Local Schools. In the letter
Dr. Shreffler recounts a invitation-only event he attended with
Governor Kasich and the many false and often downright nasty statements
made by the Governor regarding public employees in Ohio.
I was forwarded the letter again and again over the past week from good
friends, casual acquaintances, family members and people I’ve never
met. This letter has made the rounds and I’d be surprised if most of
our regular readers haven’t already read it.
I spoke with Mike this afternoon to verify that he did, in fact, write
the letter. Supposedly, there may be multiple, slightly different
versions of the letter floating around, but the one I’ve included below
is the original.
It looks like Laura Bischoff at the DDN also got the letter. Her piece
was published this afternoon and includes a couple of quotes from
Kasich spokesman Rob Nichols who, not surprisingly, denies everything
and claims Shreffler is just a “big time Democrat” spouting “Ohio
Education Association talking points.”
While Shreffler has voted for Democrats, Bischoff corrects Nichols
statement. According to Laura, Shreffler “votes a split ticket and used
to be a Republican.” I think that hardly qualifies him as “big time
Democrat.”
Bischoff also addresses Nichols’ other claim about OEA talking points:
Shreffler “has never belonged to the OEA or any other teacher union.”
And if you go through the letter below, I’ll think you’ll find yourself
hard pressed to match any of the important points to anything the OEA
is putting out.
So two of Nichols’ three claims are shown to be false or at least
inaccurate, which makes his third claim, that Schreffler’s story is
“not true”, highly suspect.
This is not the first time Kasich has been caught getting a little too
honest with a crowd he thought on his side. And this is not the first
time Nichols has had to clean up Kasich’s mess.
Right now we don’t have video to back up Dr. Shreffler’s story and we
don’t have another invitee to corroborate it. But knowing Kasich, and
having heard many similar stories over the past few months, I’m going
to take the word of this local school superintendent with nothing to
gain by writing this letter over the word of the Governor’s highly paid
spokesman whose job it is to cover up the Governor’s gaffes.
Right now we don’t have absolute proof that Kasich said “we are at war
with these people (i.e. public employees)” or that he promised to bring
back parts of SB5 after it’s defeated, or that he promised to use the
legislature to “ram it through”, but these statements are consistent
with things Kasich has said in the past and it seems highly likely that
Kasich would say something like this again, especially in a room full
of people he thought were friendly to his agenda.
Right now I’m siding with Dr. Shreffler, and after you read his letter,
I think you will too…
Read this column at Plunderbund, plus the letter in it’s entirety here
This is the article referenced by Joseph from Dayton Daily News:
Dayton Daily News...
School superintendent
blasts Kasich in letter
By Laura Bischoff
Monday, September 19, 2011
In a letter to 240 district employees, Southeast Local Schools
Superintendent Mike Shreffler criticized Gov. John Kasich for saying
public employees get free pensions and free health care coverage.
Shreffler said he attended a private meeting with Kasich and House
Speaker William Batchelder, R-Medina, on Sept. 1 at a factory in
northeast Ohio with about 200 mostly Republican supporters.
Shreffler said he got irritated when he heard the governor allege that
Ohio’s public employees don’t pay anything toward their pensions and
health care coverage.
Kasich press secretary Rob Nichols said Shreffler’s recap of the
governor’s remarks is inaccurate and reflects Ohio Education
Association talking points.
“What he claims to have happened didn’t happen. It’s not true,” Nichols
said. The governor often says that in some instances, some public
employees do not pay toward their retirement or health care, Nichols
said.
Mike Baach, a business owner in Medina County who attended the
meetting, said his recollection is the governor was responding to a
question about what was being asked of government workers and Kasich
said they would be asked to pay 15 percent of their health care costs
and some percentage of their pension contribution.
State law mandates that public workers pay 10 percent of their wages
toward their pension while their employers pay between 14 percent and
26 percent. However, about 6.6 percent of public employees have union
and individual contracts that call for the employer to pick up all or
part of the workers’ share as well, according to the state’s five
public pension systems.
Pension contribution rates, eligibility and benefits are prescribed in
state law, not union contracts.
A 2011 survey by the State Employment Relations Board of public sector
health care costs shows that public workers pay on average 9.5 percent
of the premium costs for a single plan and 10.7 percent for a family
plan. Township and city employees pay the lowest percentage — 4.9
percent and 7.7 percent, respectively — while county and state
employees pay more than 15 percent. The employee share crept up faster
last year than the employer share, the SERB report said.
Nonethless, public sector workers, in general, are paying less toward
their health care coverage than their private sector counterparts.
The U.S. Department of Labor Bureau of Labor Statistics reported in
March that private sector employers paid on average $2.12 an hour
toward employee health care coverage compared with $4.72 an hour state
and local government employers paid toward worker health insurance.
Shreffler, a registered Democrat who votes a split ticket and used to
be a Republican, said his letter “has gone viral” within the education
community and he has received emails from educators across the state.
Shreffler said he sees good and bad reforms in Senate Bill 5 and he
likes some of the policies advanced by Kasich but disagrees with him on
many of his education reforms.
“There are policies he is pushing that I like. There are some things
that he has got some real common sense on and he is right. But I’m an
educator. That is my profession. And I feel like I’m seeing public
education disappear before my eyes,” Shreffler said.
In the five page letter, Shreffler referred to the governor as a bully
and the legislature as his posse.
Shreffler disputed Nichols’ characterization of him as a “big time
Democrat” who is spouting union talking points. Shreffler said he has
never belonged to the OEA or any other teacher union.
Read this and other articles at Dayton Daily News
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