PEF President Brynien's Message

By KENNETH BRYNIEN
PEF achieved unprecedented success during the 2008 legislative session on many of our priority legislative items.

As a direct result of our Go Public legislative initiative, PEF achieved an executive order instituting many of the principles of the final piece of our campaign. The order creates a process to review the cost-effectiveness of large consultant contracts, as well as requiring state agencies to make information about contracts and their reasons for entering into contracts more publicly available. This is a major stride forward in our goal of protecting the job security of our members and ending wasteful and unnecessary contracting out.

After nearly a decade of effort, working to build support and educate lawmakers and the public about the dangers of mandated overtime for nurses, we achieved a three-way agreement among the legislative leaders and the governor to limit mandated overtime for nurses in New York State. The bill has passed both the Senate and Assembly and awaits the governor’s promised approval. This, too, is a major achievement for PEF, our nurses and for patient safety.

These are just two items that will have a tremendous effect on our members in terms of job security and working conditions. The common link in these successes has been our ability to build on our past progress – progress that had its foundation in our emphasis on building coalitions around issues, communicating a persuasive argument for our positions and, most importantly, the continuing work and commitment of our members.

Over the next year, there will, no doubt, be threats and actions detrimental to services our members provide, to our members’ job security, and to our retirement benefits. Our ability to effectively address our legislative issues bodes well for our success in any challenge we may face.

While we can revel in our successes, these victories were bittersweet for me as my good friend Pat Smith, an Executive Board member and PEF labor-management chair at the state Office of Mental Retardation and Developmental Disabilities, passed away last month.

PEF lost a strong leader who embodied the ideals of PEF in her commitment to her members and her work to benefit the consumers she served. She was a friend to many and she will be sorely missed.