Chair Talk

May 2012

The month of April has been a busy month again for SERA. Although I was out-of-state most of the month there was a flurry of phone calls and e-mails about our involvement in issues relating to SERA. Mary Pollock was quite active in the Legislative arena on our behalf. In April we received our first report of new members from APSA (copies will be distributed on May 4th). It would appear that the results of the agreement with VBS and APSA are positive as far as gaining new members for our SERA Chapters go. It will be our job to retain these new members by providing the information they are asking for and responding to any questions/concerns they may have.

I recently received a report from John Cole (APSA) as to the status of the SERA PLUS program:

Calls made:10,297
Spoke to:3,263 (32%)
Appointments set:1,403 (43%)
Appointments seen:1,028 (73%)
New SERA members:424
Using APSA services:428 (may be using multiple services — only 1 counted)

We have also invited Cheryl Streberger (SERA PLUS Project Manager) to our meeting to meet Council members.


Mary has been making contacts and inviting people to our May CC meeting so we can make some decisions about the SERA CC’s involvement in the petition drive place on the November ballot a constitutional amendment to provide true collective bargaining on wages, benefits, pensions and retirement to State Employees — this initiative is similar to the constitutional amendment (1978) that provided those rights to the Michigan State Police. There will be 2 presenters at the May 4, 2012 CC meeting:

Larry Schneider, Attorney for the Michigan State Police Troopers Association

Erin Butler from the POJ (Protect our Jobs) campaign that is coordinating the petition drive

The above speakers will provide information and answer questions/concerns about the experience that the MSPTA has had in the bargaining process and information about the petition drive.

Editor’s note: Bob Kopasz is Chair of the Michigan SERA Council. He may be reached at P.O. Box 692, Mt. Morris, MI 48458; phone 810/240-8380.