Placentia Yorba Linda California School Employees Association

Let’s make some more – keep those phones ringing…

Our actions with our allies over the past week – culminating in the civil disobedience at Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office on Tuesday – appear to have been the tipping point in the fight to get a fair debate in Congress on CSEA-endorsed HR 676, a bill to establish a single-payer healthcare program that would be publicly financed but privately delivered (similar to Medicare).

Rep. Anthony Weiner announced Wednesday evening that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is keeping her promise to him to allow his single-payer amendment a full debate and vote on the House floor!

YOUR PHONE CALLS, E-MAILS AND ACTIONS MADE THIS HAPPEN!

So let’s keep up the pressure. In fact, let’s step it up!

The Weiner amendment could be considered as early as the afternoon of Friday, November 6 so we need you to act today.

The Weiner amendment will provide an historic opportunity to have a straight up-and-down vote on single payer “Medicare for All” healthcare reform in Congress. We will finally get a fair debate in Congress on HR 676 and the merits of creating such a health program – a system that would cut healthcare costs, build on the strengths of Medicare and improve it, while expanding coverage to everyone.

Supporters of single-payer contend that a strong showing for the amendment will help set the stage for future healthcare reform activities and send the insurance industry a message that there is a strong single-payer block in Congress that will not tolerate their stranglehold on the delivery of healthcare to the American people.

House Speaker Pelosi has agreed to schedule a debate and vote on the Weiner Amendment prior to Saturday’s vote on the main bill. Pelosi’s action followed a week of intense pressure from single-payer supporters after she appeared to renege on her earlier agreement with Weiner to bring the amendment up before the full House.

Thousands of callers flooded congressional phone lines. In San Francisco, 12 activists–including representatives of CSEA, AFSCME and Grey Panthers–were arrested at a demonstration in Pelosi’s office. Similar demonstrations targeted Rep. George Miller and Rep. Henry Waxman.

Never before has Congress taken a floor vote on single-payer healthcare. Just as Rome wasn’t built in a day, we know our fight for secure, affordable, high quality healthcare is too important to back down now.

So we can’t let up.

Call Congress today!

Call your representative and state that you support the AFL-CIO’s endorsement of the Weiner amendment. Explain that, however they vote on the main healthcare bill, support for the Weiner amendment is crucial for the future of the movement for real healthcare reform. Ask them to put themselves on the record in support of healthcare as a fundamental human right! Keep it brief.

You can also reach the Washington office of your representatives by calling the Capitol Switchboard: 202-225-3121.

Next, call the House leadership to thank them for keeping their promise to allow the floor vote on the legislation.

Call Speaker Pelosi: (202) 225-4965

Call Bill Floor Manager Rep. George Miller: (202) 225-2095

Call Bill Floor Manager Rep. Henry Waxman: (202) 225-3976

Then pat yourself on the back for making history!

Action Alert: Call for the Weiner Single Payer Amendment Today!

It appears that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is wavering on her promise to Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-NY) to allow debate and a vote in the full House of Representatives on the Weiner Single Payer Amendment.

The Weiner Amendment would substitute the single payer language of HR 676 for the language of the proposed House Bill (H.R. 3962). This would be the first and only time that the full House would have an opportunity to debate and vote on single payer.

Congressman Peter Welch (D-VT), one of the seven co-sponsors of the Weiner Amendment in the Energy & Commerce Committee, is quoted in “The Hill” as predicting that the Weiner Amendment could get between 100 and 200 votes.
He estimated it would be in the “mid-100s”.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/65675-congressman-sees-votes-in-mid-100s-for-single-payer

House Energy & Commerce Committee Chairman Henry Waxman publicly related Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s promise to allow Weiner to bring his single payer amendment to the House Floor. Pelosi, through Waxman, asked Weiner and the six co-sponsors to withdraw the amendment in Committee in return for being able to offer it in the full House. You can see Waxman making the promise on behalf of Pelosi here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0fA2DfwFn4

IMMEDIATE ACTION IS CRUCIAL—CALL TODAY!

We urge you to call Speaker Pelosi’s Washington, DC office (202) 225-4965 and ask her to keep her promise to Representative Weiner and allow him to offer his Single Payer Amendment.

Also call Rep. Henry Waxman’s Washington, DC office (202) 225-3976 to ask him to urge the Speaker to honor her promise which he publicly conveyed to Rep. Weiner.

Call Rules Committee Chair Rep. Louise Slaughter, (202) 225-3615, and ask her to report the health reform bill to the floor of the House with a Rule that PERMITS consideration of the Weiner Amendment.

Call your Representative in Washington, DC (202) 224-3121 and ask that he/she contact the Speaker’s Office to urge her to honor her promise on the Weiner Amendment.

After you make your call(s) please e-mail me at pprezioso@csea.com and let me know how many calls you made…

Remember, every call counts…thanks…

It’s been almost two years since our chapter first dared to venture online. After returning from the 2008 “Member Unity Program”, a few of us gathered with much hope and enthusiasm and drafted this mission statement…

“Develop and implement a chapter website as a resource for us to gather and share information about events and topics important to us; an online newsletter of our distributed printed copy; and a place to hear questions, feedback and comments from our members.”

I’m proud to say that since then we’ve had over 13,000 visits, 105 articles, and over 230 comments by members. We have, without a doubt, succeeded in this quest and learned more than we ever bargained for. Personally it has been my pleasure to have played such a major role in a website that will continue to benefit our chapter for years to come.

But with all people-supported organizations there comes a time for those who serve to pass the torch so others can contribute and give back to an organization, a union, that has given us all so much. That time has come. I’d like to introduce to you Robert Moreno, our new web-master, an instructional aid at various sites in our district whose endless drive to learn new things – and creativity to express them – has already started to transform pylcsea.com.

I have trained Robert on most of the every day operations of running our website. I will continue to support him and will likely follow up with some advanced training in a few months. I have not, however, managed to completely absolve myself of any union responsibilities/duties – our present negotiations team has recruited me, and I will be attending the Organizing Institute for some training later this month.

Again, thank you to all who’ve made this website effective by contributing articles, making comments or just visiting the site every now and then. I only wish to see more of you volunteer your own time and by doing so learn what it really means to be part of a family at work.

Aydin Laghaie, Technology Service Technician and Active Member of CSEA

As you most likely know, the Speaker Nancy Pelosi released her healthcare bill yesterday. Missing from it was an important amendment which would make it easier for States to establish a single payer healthcare system. This amendment was in HR 3200, but stripped out of the new bill released by the Speaker yesterday. California is in a unique position to help because the three key leaders who can help are from California: Miller, Waxman and Pelosi.

President Clark gave very direct instructions to use CSEA’s power to get the Kucinich amendment back into the bill and time is very short.

By way of background, once a bill is introduced, the Speaker and leadership team (including Committee chairs Waxman and Miller) will have to decide how they will deal with any changes members may want to propose. One possibility is that they will not take amendments to be debated individually on the floor of the House; one alternative would be to assess the strength of various proposed amendments, choose the ones they believe will attract additional votes (or not lose votes), and propose those as a group for a vote in a mangers’ amendment. This would present an opportunity for Rep. Kucinich and supporters to marshal arguments for picking up the ERISA waiver for single payer states, and including it in a managers’ amendment. The final version of the manager’s amendment is expected to be done by Monday in order to give the requisite 72 hours to review the legislation and amendments, so that the bill can be voted on Thursday. Time is short to change the leadership’s mind (Miller, Pelosi and Waxman)

Speaker Nancy Pelosi…DC 202-225-4965…SF 415-556-4862…

Representative George Miller…DC 202-225-2095…Concord 925-602-1880…

Representative Henry Waxman…DC 202-225-3976…LA 323-651-1040

With that in mind I am asking that you call all of their offices and leave the CSEA message…once you have called, please e-mail me at let me know how many calls you(and any others) have made on this issue…thanks…

As you may know, your CSEA negotiating team met for the first time on Tuesday October 20 with the District team to begin our 2009/2010 contract revisions.  A big “thank you” to all those classified employees wearing blue – we noticed you!!

We began with introductions, as there were several new members on both teams.  Our team consists of Allyson Holt, Nancy Lavallee, Cheryl Townsend, Job Suarez, Aydin Laghaie, and our Labor Rep Brady Bailo.  The District’s team is Suzette Lovely, Nancy Blade, Steve Umber, Mary Adams, and Rick Lopez.

This first session was for us to set the protocol and calendar for our future meetings.  We had a great discussion, with both teams giving input for our next meeting.

We have scheduled two more dates for negotiations:  Friday November 13, and Friday November 20.  Please wear blue on these dates to show our continued CSEA solidarity.

We will give future updates as we can.  Thanks for your support!!
Your 2009/2010 Negotiating Team