The Columbus Dispatch Tuesday May 8, 2012 2:55 PM

House Republicans today moved to repeal their election-law overhaul, a move that could spark a lawsuit from Democrats and progressive groups who are unhappy that the move eliminates in-person early voting on the three days prior to the November election.

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(Sec. 1501):  The individual responsibility requirement provided for in this section is commercial and economic in nature and substantially affects interstate commerce…

Note: It is this principle that has been challenged by more than 25 states and pending in the U.S. Supreme Court.

(Sec. 1321): State Flexibility Relating to Exchanges

If a state is not an electing state OR the HHS Secretary determines on or before January 1, 2013 that an electing state will not have any required Exchange operational by Jan. 1, 2014, OR  has not taken actions the Secretary determines necessary to implement…the Secretary shall establish and operate such Exchange within the State…

(Sec. 1311): State Exchanges

Each State shall, not later than Jan. 1, 2014 establish and American Health Benefit Exchange that facilitates the purchase of qualified health plans.

(Sec. 1301): Qualified Health Plans

Qualified health plan means a health plan that is federally certified, provides essential health benefits, and is offered by an insurance issuer that complies with regulations developed by the HHS Secretary.

(Sec. 1302): Essential Health Benefits

The HHS Secretary shall define the essential health benefits, which must include at least 10 of the specified categories (e.g. hospitalization). The degree of coverage within each category will be defined by the HHS Secretary.

(Sec. 5000A): Individual Penalty

IRS statutes are amended to require the imposition of a penalty on a taxpayer’s return for each month that he/she/any dependent does not maintain minimum essential coverage.  The penalty will be phased in for 2014 and 2015. It will be $750 per person beginning in the tax year 2016. Dependents younger than 18 will be assessed ½ the penalty.  The penalty will be capped at 300% of the value of one individual.

(Sec. 4980H): Penalty for Large Employers

If a large employer (> 100 employees) fails to offer the opportunity for full time employees and their dependents to enroll in minimum essential coverage AND at least one employee secures coverage with taxpayer funded assistance from the Exchange, then the employer will be assessed on his/her taxes an amount equal to the payment assistance received by the employee times the number of individuals employed by the employer as full-time.

If a large employer DOES offer the opportunity for full time employees to enroll and one employee secures a policy from the Exchange with taxpayer funded assistance, then the employer is assessed a tax penalty of just that amount of assistance time 400%.

(Sec. 9022): Cafeteria Plans for Small Businesses

If a cafeteria plan is established and maintained by a small business employer, the requirements are met if the employer makes a contribution to provide “qualified benefits” on behalf of each employee in an amount equal to a uniform percentage (at least 2%) of the employee’s compensation OR an amount not less than either 6% of the employee’s compensation for the plan year or twice the amount of the salary reduction contributions of each qualified employee.

(Sec. 2713): Preventive Care with No Co-Pay

U.S. Preventive Services Task Force becomes the gatekeeper to cost sharing of “evidence-based items or services”.  A rating of  ‘A’ or  ‘B’ is required.

With respect to women … guidelines published by the Health Resources and Services Administration (a division of the U.S. Dept. of Health and Human Services) will determine what employers must provide for group health policies. Regulations issued based on this section of the law requires even faith-based employers to cover abortafacients, sterilizations, contraceptives, and other controversial services. Ohio has joined as a co-plaintiff in a federal lawsuit which challenges these regulations based on the free exercise clause of the First Amendment.

Sometimes legislators will draft a policy into legislation with the sincere intent of fixing, protecting, or providing laws that secure the general welfare of our communities. This is what they have sworn an oath to do. But what happens when their intentions create just the opposite effect?

Over the years there have been several movements to push states to compel Congress to call an Article V Convention for the purpose of amending our U.S. Constitution – with the intention of requiring the federal government to exercise fiscal restraint (i.e. balance the federal budget, slow the growth of federal debt, etc).

What is often misunderstood….the mechanism in the U.S. Constitutions for individual states to apply to Congress to convene a “Constitutional Convention” would actually put core principles in our federal Constitution at risk.

Article V provides for two ways to amend the U.S. Constitution. The first is authority granted to Congress to propose amendments with the approval of 2/3 of both chambers, followed by ratification by ¾ of the States OR by conventions in ¾ of the States. The second is authority given to the states to request a Constitutional Convention to propose amendments, which would also be followed by ratification by ¾ of the States or by conventions in ¾ of the States.  Who decides how these amendments are ratified?  Congress.

The States have NO role in determining how the amendments are ratified; NO role in determining who participates in the Convention; NO role in restricting the Convention to just one amendment; NO role in determining procedures for the operation of the Convention; and so forth. Do you get the picture? The only role guaranteed to State Legislatures is the ability to ask for the Convention.

There are other significant problems with the idea of convening a Constitutional Convention:

1. Article V’s description is vague and it has never been used under our current Constitution.

2. It was, however, used to create our current Constitution. The framers convened with instructions to amend the Articles of Confederation. Instead of amending this document, they ditched it for a new one.

3.  There is NO PROTECTIVE LANGUAGE in Article V against using the Constitutional Convention to revise the current Constitution beyond the purpose called for by the States. In other words, the States can pass resolutions calling for a Constitutional Convention on a single subject, but once the Convention is in process, there is nothing to prevent the participants from changing other parts of the Constitution.  This is a serious risk – not a conspiracy theory.

4. State legislators are being led to believe that they will have a role in ratifying whatever comes out of the Convention, but they are overlooking the option Congress has to exclude state legislatures in favor of unelected state conventions.

5. Our culture today is vastly different from what the Founders experienced. The proliferation of the Internet, media campaigns that often misinform the public, the general apathy of the public to be educated on constitutional issues is a recipe to deceive the states into ratifying structural changes to our constitutional republic. (i.e. national popular vote for president, which would circumvent the electoral college; requiring our federal courts to use international law to interpret domestic policies – globalism; privacy rights translated into abortion rights; etc.)

Former Chief Justice to the U.S. Supreme Court Warren Burger stated it best:

“…there is no effective way to limit or muzzle the actions of a Constitutional Convention. The convention could make its own rules and set its own agenda. Congress might try to limit the convention to one amendment or to one issue, but there is no way to assure that the convention would obey. After a convention is convened, it will be too late to stop the convention if we don’t like its agenda. The meeting in 1787 ignored the limit placed by the confederation Congress…”

Ohio has two resolutions pending that are identical. House Joint Resolution 3 (HJR3) and Senate Joint Resolution 2 (SJR2).  Please consider contacting both – your State Representative and State Senator as outlined below.

The full text may be found at http://www.legislature.state.oh.us/res.cfm?ID=129_HJR_3

IMMEDIATE ACTION IS NEEDED

Please contact your State Representative AND your State Senator. Respectfully but firmly asked that he or she vote NO on HJR3 or SJR2 if or when either comes up for a committee vote or floor vote.

SJR2 is currently pending in the Senate Finance Committee, but is not currently scheduled for hearings.

HJR3 is currently pending in the House State Government Committee chaired by State Representative Ron Maag. It has had several hearings. As soon as the Chairman determines that he has enough votes to pass it out of committee, he will schedule the vote. Please ask these committee members to vote NO.

If your time is limited, at least contact your own elected legislators and ask them to vote NO.

Members of the Ohio House State Government Committee are:

Chairman – Rep. Ron Maag    614-644-6023  (sponsor of HJR3)

Vice Chair – Rep. Michael Henne 614-644-8051  (co-sponsor of HJR3)

Rep. John Adams   614-466-1507

Rep. Louis Blessing  614-466-9091

Rep. Jim Buchy  614-466-6344

Rep. Courtney Combs  614-644-6721

Rep. Rex Damschroder  614-466-1374

Rep. Mike Dovilla  614-466-4895

Rep. Randy Gardner  614-466-8104

Rep. Cheryl Grossman  614-466-9690  (co-sponsor of HJR3)

Rep. Matt Huffman  614-466-9624

Rep. Robert Sprague  614-466-3819

Rep. Lou Terhar  614-466-8258

Rep. Ron Young  614-644-6074

Rep. Ron Gerberry  614-466-6107

Rep. Ted Celeste  614-644-6005

Rep. Kathleen Clyde  614-466-2004

Rep. Teresa Fedor  614-644-6017

Rep. Tom Letson  614-466-5358

Rep. Matt Lundy  614-644-5076

Rep. Bill Patmon  614-466-7954

Rep. Michael Stinziano  614-466-1896

Rep. Vernon Sykes  614-466-3100

by Jackie Borchardt, Staff Writer ~ Dayton Daily News

COLUMBUS — This November could set a record for citizen-driven ballot initiatives in Ohio as issues regarding marijuana, voting rights, abortion and dog auctions could be headed to the statewide ballot.

State officials have approved petition language for seven initiatives vying for a spot on the November 2012 ballot and one in 2013 to join a referendum on the elections reform law House Bill 194 and a call to revise or amend the Ohio constitution.

Voters weighed in on 15 ballot issues in 1976, but only four were citizen-initiated and the eight that passed were proposed by the General Assembly.

However, several of the issues have not garnered enough valid signatures of Ohio voters to make it on the ballot yet. To make the ballot, 385,253 valid signatures must be submitted from 44 of Ohio’s 88 counties.

But a November ballot with all seven issues would set a record for the most petition-driven initiatives in one year, according to records from the Ohio Attorney General’s office. Fourteen petition initiatives appeared on Ohio ballots since 2001 — twice as many as the 10 years before 2001.

The upsurge in petition initiatives is likely to continue, said Paul Beck, a political science professor at Ohio State University.

Petition initiatives began as a way for the public to object to legislative bodies controlled by large corporations or a few individuals.

Beck said today’s political polarization echoes that time in some ways.

When voters write laws or amend the constitution at the ballot box, the measures don’t receive the debate and thought typically given to an issue going through the General Assembly.

But Beck said the legislative process isn’t working that way.

“Assemblies in Ohio and the U.S. Congress are more interested in scoring points on the other side than they are on trying to perfect legislation so there’s none of this give and take that is the hallmark of deliberative democracy,” Beck said.

The issues and the ballot process

Four ballot initiatives are tied to unsatisfactory or stalled legislation: Two medical marijuana amendments (Ohio Medical Cannabis and Ohio Alternative Treatment), regulations for dog breeders (Ohio Dog Auctions Act) and removing redistricting power from elected officials (Ohio Citizens Independent Redistricting Commission.)

Legislative districts drawn to favor one party or another have produced a polarized General Assembly, said Ann Henkener, spokesperson for the group behind the redistricting amendment and board member of the League of Women Voters of Ohio.

“(A petition) is our only alternative when the Legislature is really not getting to the needs of middle Ohio,” Henkener said.

Henkener said districts should be drawn to reflect Ohio’s 50-50 party line split to spur more competitive elections, which is also a goal of the citizen redistricting commission the petition supports.

Tonya Davis, a committee member for the Ohio Alternative Treatment Act, said she would prefer the General Assembly pass House Bill 214, which was introduced one year ago and never moved past initial committee hearings.

Davis, a Kettering resident, suffers from several ailments and says marijuana provides relief without resorting to addictive narcotics. She said she’s lobbied lawmakers for 10 years and called the petition initiative a reaction to lawmakers’ inaction. “They’re supposed to represent me, the registered voter, and they’re not doing that,” Davis said. Davis said Ohioans should weigh in on the issue and cited a 2009 University of Cincinnati poll that found 73 percent of Ohio adults favored allowing medical marijuana.

The others are taking on issues that supporters say lawmakers won’t debate because they’re too politically charged:

• Allowing workers to opt out of union membership and dues (freedom to choose whether to participate in a labor organization).

• An anti-abortion amendment extending the title of person at the time of conception (Personhood Ohio).

• Allowing same-sex marriages and churches to not recognize those marriages (Freedom to Marry and Religious Freedom.)

“It’s frustrating when you have good legislation someone submits and it gets held up in committee,” said Dr. Patrick Johnston of the Personhood Ohio effort. “With an initiative, you can bypass that.”

Johnston said more constitutional amendment proposals signify a growing dissatisfaction with federal and state government.

Chris Littleton, spokesman for Ohioans for Workplace Freedom and former president of the Cincinnati Tea Party and the Ohio Liberty Council, agreed. “The political system as it’s structured right now doesn’t lend itself to constructive changes of any kind,” Littleton said. “It lends itself to partisan battles that work for the wrong reasons.”

Littleton said the right-to-work amendment is not the same issue as Senate Bill 5, which would have reformed public employee unions and was easily defeated by voter referendum last fall.

Ian James, co-founder of the Freedom To Marry group, said the Senate Bill 5 referendum generated a greater sense of activism in Ohio. “People saw what happened when working families were under siege. There is a sense that loving couples who can’t have their relationships recognized, they feel under siege,” James said.

Chris Slagle, an attorney with Bricker and Eckler of Columbus, said the number of proposed initiatives isn’t significantly more than recent years. “To get an effort on the ballot simply requires a lot of planning and strategy and I don’t know that one effort in one year correlates to subsequent year — it’s just the way the timing works out.”

Successfully getting an issue to the ballot costs an average $1.5 million including advertisements, legal fees and petition circulators, said Secretary of State Jon Husted. “It’s no longer the sympathetic way that citizens go out and have their voice heard,” Husted said. “It’s a professional political process now that people have used to, at best, advance issues they care about and, at worst, turn into another way for consultants and political operatives to make money.”

Husted said the state spent more than $2 million to advertise the 2011 ballot issues in Ohio newspapers.

Only three groups hired professional petition circulators as of Friday — Ohioans for Workplace Freedom, the Ohio Clean Energy Initiative and the Ohio Dog Auctions Act, according to records filed with the secretary of state.

Beck said the total votes cast drops for initiatives further down the ballot, so groups need to make sure their initiatives and messaging about them is clear. “There’s a tendency for voters when they are confused to vote ‘no,’ ” Beck said.

http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/election/ohio-voters-may-face-most-issues-in-history-1360504.html

FY 2012 Budget Solutions from Congressman Paul Ryan (Chair of the U.S. House Committee on the Budget)

April 5, 2011

(excerpt from p. 38)

There is a widely shared consensus in this country in support of a strong safety net for Americans who, through no fault of their own, have fallen on hard times. However, the government programs that make up this safety net are failing both the citizens who rely on them and the taxpayers who fund them. It should not come as a surprise that a system designed in the 1960s is not equipped to deal with the unique pressures of the 21st century.

From a budgetary perspective, these programs are growing at an unsustainable rate. Medicaid spending is growing by over 7 percent a year – far faster than the growth of the overall economy. Federal spending on food stamps has quadrupled over the past ten years.And spending on federal rental assistance programs has increased by 33 percent since 2006.This rate of spending will strain the safety net until it breaks, necessitating much higher taxes on all Americans and indiscriminate cuts that hit the poorest Americans the hardest.

From a moral perspective, these programs are failing the very people they are intended to help. First, the strains they have placed on federal and state budgets have effectively broken these programs, especially Medicaid. In response to budget constraints, governments continually underpay doctors and hospitals – making across-the- board cuts to a one-size-fits-all program instead of implementing smart reforms that allow states to carefully tailor benefits. As a result, doctors and nurses are fleeing the system to escape endless red tape and underpayments. Meanwhile, beneficiaries are left with fewer provider choices and reduced access to care.

Second, many of these programs do not provide beneficiaries with the tools they need to bounce back into self- sufficient working lives as quickly as possible. Bipartisan efforts in the late 1990s transformed cash welfare by encouraging work, limiting the duration of benefits, and giving states more control over the money being spent. Opponents of these reforms said that they would lead to large increases in poverty and despair.

Instead, the exact opposite occurred.These reforms cut welfare caseloads in half against a backdrop of falling poverty rates. Child-poverty rates fell by 1 percent per year in the five years following the passage of the 1996 welfare-reform bill.Today, a smaller percentage of American children live in poverty than in 1995, even though the nation is still emerging from a severe recession.

Complete Report (73 pages in length)

By Kirk Victor, The Fiscal Times

August 25, 2011

Freshman senators typically are seen but not heard, but it didn’t take long for Republican Rob Portman of Ohio to shatter that mold.

When the Senate’s “Gang of Six” Democrats and Republicans tried to hammer out a deficit-reduction plan earlier this year, they repeatedly turned to Portman for advice on fiscal issues. Then, as the battle over raising the debt ceiling reached the boiling point earlier this month, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., leaned heavily on Portman for technical and political advice in negotiating with President Obama and Democratic leaders.

“McConnell had Portman in the room for the last 35 days leading up to the deal,” says Scott Reed, a veteran GOP strategist who was Bob Dole’s campaign manager in the 1996 presidential race. “He is knowledgeable; he has real-world experience and fully understands how Congress works.”

So it was hardly surprising when McConnell picked Portman as one of three Republican senators to serve on the bipartisan “Super Committee.” Although he is new to the Senate, the affable Ohioan boasts a gold-plated résumé that makes him invaluable to Republican leaders — and a potential ally for Democrats:

During his career in the House from 1993 to 2005, Portman authored or co-authored over a dozen bills that became law, including legislation to reform the Internal Revenue Service and curb unfunded federal mandates. A number of times he collaborated with Democrats to pass legislation. In 2005 he left Congress to join President George W. Bush’s administration, first as U.S. Trade Representative and then as director of the Office of Management & Budget, where he honed his expertise on spending and tax issues.

Even as skeptics dismiss the Super Committee as a prescription for more gridlock, Portman is seen by many seasoned observers — Republicans and Democrats alike — as a pivotal figure in helping bridge the partisan divide and facilitate the chance for a deal. Former Sen. Alan Simpson of Wyoming, the Republican co-chairman of President Obama’s bipartisan fiscal commission, told The Fiscal Times that Portman “could easily be a catalyst” to getting a deal. “He is the best there is — he has the trust of both Democrats and Republicans. He’s very authentic and knows the game since he has been there with budget issues,” Simpson added.

Portman will join Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., as the three Republican senators serving on the 12-member panel, which has until Thanksgiving to submit major deficit reduction proposals to Congress. The committee makeup is dominated by liberal Democrats concerned about protecting Medicare and other entitlement programs from deep cuts and conservative Tea Party members who oppose raising tax revenues to help reduce the long term debt.

full article

City to pay out $93M to retirees

Contracts let workers retire with six-figure sums for unused leave,sick pay

By Barry M. Horstman
bhorstman@enquirer.com

By squirreling away hundreds of hours of unused holiday, vacation and sick days, more than 900 Cincinnati employees – nearly one in five – may receive at least six months’ extra pay when they retire, costing taxpayers more than $93 million.

A total of 120 of them can look forward to at least a year’s extra salary upon retirement thanks to contract provisions that make it relatively easy for workers to accumulate and cash in huge amounts of unused leave, an Enquirer analysis of city records shows.

The City Council-approved contracts include benefits that, among other things, permit manyworkers to draw 13 sick days a year, grant three weeks’ worth of compensatory time to public safety employees for holidays whether they work them or not, and entitle veteran police officers to nearly 10½ weeks of various leaves annually.

Fourteen workers are eligible for two or more extra years’ salary, led by Cincinnati police Lt. David Fink. Over his 25-year career, Fink has stored up nearly 10,600 hours – the equivalent of five years of work worth at least $434,857.

Fink is one of 10 police supervisors who could eventually retire with unused compensatory and leave time valued at more than $200,000 – money that can be taken in either a lump sum or, for tax considerations or other reasons, by continuing to draw a regular check from the city after leaving the department.

“That’s some gold watch,” said Steve Erie, a political science professor and director of urban studies at the University of California, San Diego.

Another 38 Cincinnati workers currently are in line for $100,000-plus checks – “lump-outs,” in city payroll jargon – when they retire or leave for another job. Hundreds more of the city’s 5,092 full-time workers, though, also could walk away with tens of thousands of dollars, with 206 having balances between $50,000 and $100,000.

The biggest payouts – all legal and permitted under city decisions and state laws dating back, in many instances, a quarter century or longer – generally will go to 914 employees with more than six months of accumulated leave…

full article

by Jim Siegel

SUNDAY, APRIL 10, 2011

With chants of “We are Ohio,” an estimated 11,000 union supporters rallied at the Statehouse yesterday to launch the effort to overturn the law that would weaken public workers’ bargaining power.

The crowd was the largest since the debate over Senate Bill 5 began in February. Many also signed up to help collect the 231,000 signatures needed to get a referendum on the November ballot.

“We haven’t seen this type of energy since 1983,” Michael Weinman, a retired Columbus police officer who was shot and paralyzed in the line of duty in 1998, said of the year the collective-bargaining law was passed in Ohio. He also is the treasurer of We Are Ohio, a coalition of unions and their supporters that organized the rally and is leading the effort to overturn the law.

Unions know they need to keep supporters fired up through November if they want to be successful, and they need to craft the right message to persuade voters to take the rare step of striking down a law. Both sides will argue that they are protecting the middle class; Republicans say the law will spare Ohioans from future tax increases.

Melissa Cropper, a librarian for Georgetown schools in southwestern Ohio, said killing the law “is about saving the middle class and protecting the rights of workers. Corporations are getting all the breaks, and they’re trying to balance the budget on the backs of the workers.”

Columbus firefighter John Capretta told the crowd that the issue isn’t Democratic or Republican. “This matter is between the rich and the working-class people.

“We are the only ones standing in the rich’s way to take over this country and run it like a dictatorship,” he said.

Then his young daughter took the microphone: “Gov. Kasich, quit messing with my daddy.”

We Are Ohio took the first official step in the referendum process last week, turning in nearly 3,000 signatures and proposing petition language. If that effort is certified, the group must collect about 231,000 signatures by June 30 to get on the ballot.

full article

OHIO LEGISLATION HIGHLIGHTS

H.B. No. 153 – State Biennium Budget

link to portion relevant to education policy (begins at the bottom of the first pdf page – doc. page 1001)

Sec. 3319.111 Not later than July 1, 2013 the local board of education, in consultation with teachers employed by the board shall adopt a standards-based teacher evaluation policy that conforms with the framework for evaluation of teachers developed under section 3319.112 of the Revised Code. The policy shall become operative at the expiration of any collective bargaining agreement and shall be included in any renewal or extension of such collective bargaining agreement. (p. 1374)

When using measures of student academic growth as a component of a teacher’s evaluation, those measures shall include the value-added progress dimension prescribed by section 3302.021 of the Revised Code. Alternative assessments are described in the law for subjects not applicable to the value-added measures (i.e. art, music, etc.)  (p. 1375)

Sec. 3319.112 Not later than December 31, 2011, the state board of education shall develop a standards-based state framework for the evaluation of teachers. The framework shall establish an evaluation system that does the following:

1. Provides for multiple evaluation factors, including student academic growth which shall count for 50% of each evaluation

2. Is aligned with the standards for teachers adopted under section 3319.61 of the Revised Code

3. Requires observation of the teacher being evaluated, including at least two formal observations by the evaluator of at least 30 minutes each and classroom walkthroughs

4. Assigns a rating on each evaluation in accordance with division (B) of this section

5. Requires each teacher to be provided with a written report of the results of the teacher’s evaluation

6. Identifies measures of student academic growth for grade levels and subjects for which the value-added progress dimension prescribed by section 3302.021 of the Revised Code does not apply

7. Implements a classroom-level, value-added program developed by a nonprofit organization described in 3302.021 of the Revised Code

8. Provides for professional development to accelerate and continue teacher growth and provide support to poorly performing teachers

9. Provides for the allocation of financial resources to support professional development.

Ratings assigned to teachers will be as follows:  Accomplished, proficient, developing, ineffective

Note: The implementation of these new requirements will not be affected by the pending referendum on SB5.

SB5: Restructures Salary System for Most Public Employees and Revises Policies for Public Unions

Passed Ohio General Assembly – March 30, 2011

Bill Text

Vote Records

Current law provides opportunities for specified public employees (state, county, municipal, township, school districts, etc) to belong to a bargaining unit (union) certified by the State Employees Relations Board. For these employees there has been a process to bargain collectively for wages, hours, terms, and conditions of employment. SB5 would revise the process to negotiate for labor agreements, but would not eliminate them.

In addition, SB5 would institute a salary system in which progression through the system would be based on performance for both union and nonunion public employees.  The details of the new system will be developed in a rules process, open to the public.

SB 5 would not change the following options or requirements in current law:

1. Individuals not wanting to join a local union may opt out.

2. Director of Administrative Services may offer to nonunion state employees the payments or benefits provided to union employees under a collective bargaining agreement if the duties are similar. These benefits include leave benefits, disability, holiday pay, pay supplements, but not wages or salaries.

3. Public employers will still contribute to the employees pension system. The statutes governing the percentage of employer required contributions are not in SB5 and not changed by the passage of the bill.

4. Public employees will still have health care insurance that covers hospitalization, surgical, major medical, dental, vision, medical care, disability, hearing aids, and prescription drugs.  Health care insurance for teachers and other school employees will still have the protective oversight of the School Employees Health Care Board.

5. Public employees will still be able to cash out unused sick leave at the time of retirement, but it will be capped at 1000 hours.

6. Public employees will still get overtime pay, but it will be capped at the hourly overtime rate established under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act.

7. Collective Bargaining for labor agreements will still have a fact-finding if there is an impasse. At this stage the State Employees Relations Board will still appoint a mediator. It is the binding arbitration phase that will change in SB5 (see notes below).

A few of the changes made by  SB 5 in state law:

1. Individuals freely choosing to not join the union will not be required to pay a “fair share” fee.

2. Public employers will no longer double pay into the employees pension. “Pension pick up” is the requirement in some labor agreements in which the employer pays its portion into the pension and also pays the employees share. This double expenditure is eliminated in SB5 and the employee will be responsible to pay his/her own share into the system. The employers will also continue to pay their portion.

3. In the negotiations for a labor agreement, if there is still an impasse after the mediation phase, both parties would have the opportunity to present their best offers to the legislative body (i.e city council, school board, etc). These elected members would hold a public hearing and vote on a final version of the contract.  If this body fails to act or certain processes are not followed, either party may choose to put both agreements on the ballot and let the voters (taxpayers) decide.