Our unity is our strength; Don’t let them divide us

Our unity is our strength; Don’t let them divide us

By KENNETH BRYNIEN
This past month has been extraordinarily stressful for all of us. The elimination of our raises, the reopening of our contract, unpaid furloughs, layoffs and the shutdown of state government were all issues that threatened us.

We fought back against each threat, meeting every challenge. We kept our contract intact, started receiving our raises, prevented furloughs and layoffs, and the state remained open for business. We kept our cool and remained united in purpose. All through our rallies, our lobbying and letter-writing campaigns, and in your responses to our survey, you have fully supported and participated in our efforts.

We know the truth in the adage, “In unity there is strength.”

Unfortunately, the challenges we face are not over and the governor and the right-wing media outlets understand the adage as well as we do. They understand the only way to break our strength is to break our unity. So, they are now attempting to divide us. Furloughs, layoffs and a government shutdown would only affect some of our members, but not others. The Early Retirement Incentive will be offered to some of our members, not others.

Meanwhile, the governor speaks in contradictions; stating the replacement of consultants with state employees would not save much money, but only serve to increase PEF’s power. This, of course, is false. Study after study proves our case. In another statement, the governor said PEF’s leaders don’t care about layoffs, because laid-off members don’t vote. This, too, is false. Not only do we fight for every job, a loss of members would decrease our power.

In yet other contradictory statements, the governor has said PEF’s officers aren’t state employees, implying we wouldn’t feel the sting of furloughs or the demands of sacrifice, you would. Absurd!

He says we have manipulated him into asking for layoffs because this is what we want. Ridiculous!

The most right-wing newspaper in the state claims I received a 22 percent raise last year. An outright lie!

I and all of the PEF officers received the same 3 percent raise last year and 4 percent raise this year as did all of our PS&T members, and we did not receive them until every member did. In fact, none of the officers will receive raises until all of our members receive their retroactive pay.

The purpose behind all of these things, the differential treatment of our members, the false statements made to the press and the outright lies, is very clear. They are meant to divide and conquer us. To divide members from the union leadership and from each other is the only way to defeat us. There is another adage that applies here: “United we stand, divided we fall.”

We cannot, we must not, and we will not let anyone divide us. Every member must remain active and informed. We will remain united. We will remain strong. We will persevere.