Gov. Jerry Brown’s administration is tying up a glut of expired labor contracts as the year draws to a close.
Aside from reaching a tentative deal with the state’s biggest union, SEIU Local 1000, earlier this month, Brown’s team has struck tentative agreements with a union that represents 12,000 maintenance workers and another that advocates for 6,000 psychiatric technicians.
If all of the contracts are ratified by members and approved by the Legislature, the state would have just two outdated labor deals. That’s down from a peak of 14 that expired on July 1.
One new deal announced this week would give a 14 percent raise over three years to the maintenance workers and electricians in International Union of Operating Engineers.
For them, the new offer provides a bigger raise than a proposal they rejected in July. Many of its members also would receive special salary adjustments bumping up their pay by an additional 5 percent. Some heavy equipment mechanics and telecommunications technicians would gain as much as an extra 10 percent in special pay increases.
The contract is considered a five-year agreement because it’s backdated to July 1, 2015, when the union’s last labor agreement expired.
Another tentative contract would provide a 9 percent raise over three years to the California Association of Psychiatric Technicians, who staff state hospitals and developmental centers. Its senior psychiatric technicians would gain an additional 3 percent and psychiatric technician instructors would get an extra 5 percent.
The union’s leaders say they gained some important quality-of-life perquisites for the technicians, such as a limit on mandatory overtime and a loosening of rules that will allow workers to trade shifts.
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