CALL TO ACTION: SB 5694 needs your voice!

Many of you are aware of the issues at bargaining specifically around the states inability to use the salary survey. Seamus, WPEA Lobbyist, has asked that we act today or tomorrow!
 
If you have questions about this action or want to plug into future legislative actions, please contact [email protected]!
 
Message from Seamus:
SB 5694 is a bill that will allow the state's salary survey to be used in bargaining and give state employees more of a voice in the salary survey itself. Right now, the bill is in the Senate Ways and Means Committee, and it needs to be scheduled for a hearing as soon as possible.
 
5694 is the bill to tell OFM that they can, in fact, use their own salary survey when considering which job classes should get targeted pay increases. It also gives state employees - the folks actually doing the work - a voice in how the salary survey is structured. 

CALL TO ACTION: It would be a big help if, today and tomorrow, Senator June Robinson got some friendly reminders to schedule the bill for a hearing and a vote. 
 
Please send her an email at [email protected] asking her to schedule SB 5694 for a hearing and a vote. There are talking points at the bottom of the email. You can also email the member of the Ways & Means committee who represents your district, or the district nearest you. I've included some of the most important and/or likely to be sympathetic here:
 

• June Robinson (Everett), [email protected]
  (Chair)
• Lynda Wilson (E. Vancouver, Camas, Stevenson), [email protected]

(ranking member)

• Ann Rivers (Salmon Creek, Battle Ground), [email protected]
  (assistant ranking member)
• Sam Hunt (Olympia/Lacy/Tumwater), [email protected]
  (he's the prime sponsor and chair of the bill's first committee, he gets the bill, be nice to him) 
• Andy Billig (Spokane), [email protected]
  (senate majority leader)
• Jamie Pedersen (Capitol Hill, Fremont, Belltown)
• Bob Hasegawa (Renton/Tukwilla), [email protected]
• Steve Conway (S. Tacoma, Spanaway), [email protected]
• Matt Boehnke (Richland, Kennewick), [email protected]
• Kevin Van De Wege (Olympic Peninsula), [email protected]
• Nikki Torres (Yakima, Pasco, Hanford), [email protected]
• Emily Randall (S. Kitsap County, Gig Harbor), [email protected]
• Lisa Wellman (Mercer Island, Bellevue, Sammamish), [email protected]
• Ron Muzzall, (Whidbey Island, Mt. Vernon), [email protected] 

 
########
 
Talking Points:
Dear Senator Robinson [or whoever],
I am a member of the Washington Public Employees Association and I work at _________________. As a state employee / union member / steward / bargaining team member, I am asking you to pass SB 5694 out of committee.
 
SB 5694 allows the Office of Financial Management more flexibility at the negotiating table and gives state employees - the folks doing the work - some shared responsibility in crafting the survey itself. 
 
Every two years, the state conducts a salary survey that demonstrates just how far behind market rate many state employee salaries are. But at the bargaining table, OFM says they can't use the salary survey as a reason to raise salaries. 
 
A labor/management workgroup the legislature created last year to address the problem found that changing the way the salary survey is used at the bargaining table would require a change in law. 5694 will make these important changes.
 
After years of neglect, the state is facing a massive staffing crisis [include an anecdote from your own worksite]
 
Please pass SB 5694 out of Ways and Means by this Monday, to help reduce the turnover and vacancy rates in state service and improve the state’s collective bargaining process.