How to increase union membership among non-government workers? Legislate it – and include it as a non-fiscal policy item in your state’s massive budget bill.

Just what the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) and its supporters did in 2008. And just what the SEIU did in earlier years, first establishing a pilot referral program in Dane County.

The Wisconsin Democracy Campaign provides the “follow-the-money” history: In 2002,”four SEIU locals made over $750,000 in independent expenditures, mostly on behalf of Dem primary candidate (and not coincidentally, Dane County Executive) Kathleen Falk. Eight SEIU locals inside and outside Wisconsin contributed another $190,000+, with “most of the contributions” going to Falk. 

In 2004, SEIU locals contributed $17,500 to Governor Jim Doyle, not up for reelection that year. In 2006, the SEIU Political Education and Action Fund (SEIU PEA) made independent expenditures of $36,651 on behalf of Doyle. They also joined with AFSCME in sponsoring issue ads targeting Doyle opponent Mark Green, with plans to spend about $500,000.

Perhaps it’s not hard to understand then, why Governor Doyle’s 2009-2011 proposed budget containing 80 non-fiscal policy items (that aren’t supposed to be in the budget in the first place.) The budget created the Wisconsin Quality Home Care Authority (“the QHCA”), a brand new stand- in for a government employees union. It’s probably not hard to understand, either, that the seeds of QHCA were sowed years earlier with a Dane County SEIU/Wisconsin Regional Training Partnership cooperative referral program in July, 2003.

The stated goal for the newly formed QHCA is to provide a “forum for efforts to increase the number of individual home care providers in the state and improve quality of care.”

Private providers maintain they have ample personal care providers available for their clients and didn’t need governmental involvement, much less competition, to get the job done.

Wisconsin statutes now stipulate that any adult receiving home care services from an independent provider and assisted by Medicaid or any number of government plans, can “receive a benefit for home care services only if he or she:

1. informs the QHCA of contact information and dates of hire and termination and;

2. compensates providers in accordance with any applicable collective bargaining agreement.

Exempted from participation with the QHCA are employees of private home care and county agencies; also exempted from registry listing are independent home care workers not desiring referrals (e.g., family members currently being paid to provide care).

In order to administer this brand new union/agency, $500,000 in state dollars have been appropriated to hire an executive director and additional QHCA employees, and to enter into the contracts necessary “to carry out the duties of the QHCA.” Those duties include establishing the registry mentioned, recruiting and retaining an expanded “pool of providers, qualify[ing] providers, orient[ing] and train[ing] providers and operat[ing] a 24/7 on-call referral service for consumers.” (From QHCA Board Presentation, PowerPoint)

The statute “permits, but does not require” workers to form a union. A labor organization need only “demonstrate a showing of interest” of at least 3% of providers on the QHCA’s list (currently about 5,500) in order to be given that complete list of providers, with all their contact information. The providers may not opt out of having their name and contact information supplied to the union.

According to an April. 4, 2010 QHCA Q & A handout, home care workers are warned they will receive “several mailings from the labor organization over the course of the campaign [about] union activities,” to request they submit a support card and to inform them how, when and where to vote, should an election be authorized.

When asked if an independent home care worker is forced to join the union, the QHCA says:

No one can be forced to join a union. The new law gives independent home care workers the option to organize into a statewide union if they so choose. Even if a person chooses not to join the union he/she will be represented if the majority of votes favor the union.

Those votes were cast in an election tallied May 6 of this year. According to a SEIU press release:

In one of the state's largest union elections in decades, 5,500 home care providers overwhelmingly voted 'yes' to unite in the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). SEIU is the largest and fastest growing union of healthcare workers in the Americas.

The actual vote totals? As confirmed by the SEIU and The Wisconsin Employment Relations Commission, 1249 for, 750 against. So 22% of the approximately 5,500 independent providers receiving a ballot said YES. Now they’re all in. And now all (effective July 1, 2011) must charge their employers collectively bargained wages. According to the QHCA, the issue of whether dues will be required for non-union members has not yet been negotiated.

And who negotiates with the SEIU on behalf of clients needing workers and on behalf of Wisconsin taxpayers? DHS. And of course, DHS must then come up with the dollars to pay consumers who qualify for a government home care subsidy and who will ultimately pay those union wages to their independently-contracted home care helpers.

So, the State of Wisconsin, struggling to cover health insurance and medical assistance costs as it is, sets up a quasi-governmental authority that has the government negotiating wages and the government reimbursing clients for those same costs. How will they cover potentially skyrocketing personnel costs?

The Wisconsin Homecare Organization (WHO) objected  to the creation of the QHCA as a “wolf in grandma’s clothing,” being sold as helping to assure quality home care. Truth be told, the Authority is authorized to simply do criminal background checks – and has no method of enforcing, much less assuring any level of quality of care.

WHO also objected to the creation of the new QHCA via the budget document, believing this major public policy change deserved its own full hearing.

Because the authority would be funded by the state and because the governor would appoint its board, the authority would create – in essence – a business competition between the state and personal care businesses. Worse, the competition would be on an uneven playing field, as most personal care agencies are small businesses that cannot compete with the state, either for employees or for clients.

Who will fund this union payback, this competition on an uneven playing field? You. Your state and your federal taxes. Secreted away in Wisconsin’s budget document, passed lock stock and barrel by the legislature and boldly signed by what was soon to become, a lame-duck governor.

-May 18, 2010

Jo Egelhoff runs FoxPolitics.net.