The California United Homecare Workers (CUHW) union will be holding a rally on Tuesday and we need your help to make it a success. Please join us as we continue our fight to improve the lives of those who keep our seniors and people with disabilities healthy at home. Here are the details:
What: Rally for Homecare Justice – Wear red to show that you “have a heart” for homecare.
Where: Humboldt County Courthouse, 825 Fifth Street, Eureka
When: Tuesday, February 5 at 12:30 pm
Why: Negotiations with the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors, acting as the Humboldt County In-Home Supportive Services (IHSS) Public Authority, have dragged on for over a year as the Supervisors have refused to offer a single penny to the lowest paid caregivers in California. After the workers put forward a Settlement Proposal last December, the Board of Supervisors unilaterally ended negotiations and refused to consider the proposal.
The Supervisors have yet to provide a valid explanation for their refusal to pay homecare workers more than minimum wage. Last September, an impartial Fact Finder (paid for by both the County and CUHW) determined that “the County Clearly has the ability to pay the modest increases sought (as it has acknowledged) and has even budgeted sufficient funds to cover most, if not all the costs.”
Since then, the County has received more than $164,000 in federal funds through the Community First Choice Option (CFCO), a funding source specifically intended to support home- and community-based care options like IHSS. Other counties, including Yolo, Los Angeles, and San Joaquin have committed to using CFCO funds for homecare wages.
Not only does the County clearly have the ability to pay its modest portion of the proposed raise, it also has an opportunity to leverage additional funds that would otherwise be spent in other communities. Because IHSS is primarily paid for by state and federal dollars, approval of CUHW’s Settlement Proposal would infuse our local economy with more than $1.5 million.
If you agree that homecare workers deserve a raise, please join us on Tuesday. CUHW will also be joined at the rally by allies from local non-profits, other unions, the disability rights community, and senior advocates, among others. Following the rally, community supporters are invited to attend a reception at the union’s office, located at 314 L Street, Eureka.
For more information, email shaneb@cuhw.orgor call (707) 382-7270.
– To contact the Supervisors:
Rex Bohn <rbohn@co.humboldt.ca.us> 476-2391 Estelle Fennell <efennell@co.humboldt.ca.us> 476-2392 Mark Lovelace <mlovelace@co.humboldt.ca.us> 476-2393 Virginia Bass <vbass@co.humboldt.ca.us> 476-2394 Ryan Sundberg <rsundberg@co.humboldt.ca.us> 476-2395
Sohum Parlance II 
15 comments
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February 4, 2013 at 12:05 pm
Anonymous
I have a question — how much additional money would the county have to pay next year to grant the raise, compared to how much the county would pay out if there is no raise for another year. The press release states that the state and feds would kick in $1.5 million (I’m assuming that’s an annual figure, please correct me if I’m wrong).
Even if the immediate cost to the county budget is significant, if it’s going leverage $1.5 million from the state and the feds, and these combined county, state and federal funds can help enable qualified, experienced, competent, dedicated people to become and remain IHSS workers, doesn’t that seem like a pretty darn good deal for the county?
It is my understanding that there is currently a rather high turnover among IHSS workers, largely due to the substandard pay and lack of benefits. Which is not surprising, as I am not aware of any industry or job category in which lower pay and higher turnover results in a more qualified, experienced, competent and dedicated workforce, and a better work product.
So has it been the belief of previous Supervisors that IHSS is somehow the one area of human endeavor where underpaying the workers increases the quality of the work product? Or did they just not care enough about work product — in this case quality home care for our elders — to make it a priority?
February 4, 2013 at 1:25 pm
Mitch
Want to see how easy it is to raise IHSS salaries to a slightly more decent level? Just cap Supervisor salaries and management salaries everywhere in the county to eight times the equivalent full time annual salary at IHSS rates. Voila — instant need for an annual raise for IHSS workers.
February 4, 2013 at 1:41 pm
Forest Queen
Perhaps some of the Health Care Workers are facing ‘fore-closure’ . . . if not, may this info. then be useful to those who are:
FORECLOSURE FRAUD
Take Your Home Back
ROBO-SIGNING OVERVIEW (link)
Robo-signing involves persons signing documents and swearing to their accuracy without verifying any of the information. Robo-Signers can be mortgage lending company employees who prepared and signed off on foreclosures without reviewing them, as the law requires. Any apparent sale based on Robo-Signed docs. is void. A notary who helps commit real estate fraud is liable. “Robo” actions are just the tip of the iceberg to be seen.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=D&q=http://www.hofj.org/virtualoffice_files/Robo-Signing-Overview.pdf&usg=AFQjCNE7s2TCM8iOI0f2ft_GqGuYm48Cgg
February 4, 2013 at 1:42 pm
Anonymous
What is the current ratio of Humboldt County Supervisor and Department Head compensation to IHSS worker compensation? Sadly I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s already 10:1, at least if you include the Supervisors’ and Department Heads’ benefits.
I might be willing to compensate a County Supervisor 3 times as much as an IHSS worker would get if they worked 40 hrs a week, and I might be willing to pay a top level manager as much as 4 times as much as an IHSS worker — maybe even 5 times as much if the top level manager job requires an advanced degree and years of experience — but 8 or 10 times as much? No way.
So I’m with you in principle — we should either raise the IHSS pay, or reduce the Supervisors & top level managers…or both. But I would go a bit further, and reduce that gap to a maximum of 3:1 for supervisors and 4:1 or at most maybe 5:1 for management positions that require many years of education and experience.
.
February 4, 2013 at 2:02 pm
Forest Queen
Federal Fun Ding is what’s killing us (among others) – the cost is too great.
The money is right here in Humboldt.
February 4, 2013 at 2:10 pm
Forest Queen
Supervisors – $35.00/hr., + benefits including dependents, blank check travel expense, early retirement with obscene retirement income, and more that we’re not aware of.
February 4, 2013 at 3:05 pm
Mitch
1:42,
The county salary schedule is online here: https://co.humboldt.ca.us/jobs/salary/
For example, go to that page, pick Custodian under “Find a salary…” and read the “hourly” line, starting at $11.49 and stepping to $14.74 after five years. That doesn’t include “Senior Custodian.”
Nothing against custodians — I think that a hard-working custodian would deserve far more than $14.74 per hour. But what do IHSS workers get paid per hour again?
February 4, 2013 at 3:13 pm
Mitch
Hey, here are two interesting ones: IT Division Director, at $38 to $48 per hour before longevity increases. This is very, very different than Health and Human Services, Deputy Director, Information Services, at $38 to $48 per hour before longevity increases.
The difference is one directs information technology (IT) but the other directs information services (IS). The county could never get by with just one department or the other, so it has two. Phil Crandall doesn’t have to share.
What amazes me is that Health and Human Services has only one director of information services, and not a single director of information technology. That’s pretty sad.
February 4, 2013 at 7:58 pm
"Henchman Of Justice"
Elected officials have always paid themselves better because they are the ones to vote on it, even though it is a conflict of interest situation, but perfectly legal. Subordinate employees usually always get the scrapings. One of the few exceptions is an employee lawsuit against the public entity employer….Tamara Falor (County), the Dee Dee Wilson thing-a-ma-bob in Eureka, etc… that is how a lower public employee makes off with a cash pay-off….get caught-up in a scandal of sorts and then the pay-off is for silence on the matter. – HOJ
February 4, 2013 at 8:38 pm
moviedad
When you start looking a wage disparity, you’re opening a can of worms that will naturally lead to looking at income inequality on a national level. Should we start there? No, probably not.; starting out by helping this one group of workers could help build momentum for more afterwards. But it’s going to take everybody to make it happen, but at 12:30 pm, a lot of us won’t be able to come.
Just how it is. It’s gotta happen in the middle of the day to have any effect on the supervisors.
February 12, 2013 at 12:24 pm
"Henchman Of Justice"
Last read was that the organizer/spokesperson who his touting for the raise has dropped benefits and went with a .75 cent raise. Pardon my french, but wtf is .75 cents an hour wage gonna do for the employee base when $2 or more is needed just to keep up with rising societal costs, and holy forbid if any of the employee base personnel live in State Responsibility Areas where Governor fraud for frack decided to loot more from property owners and their ability to live life on a low budget plan because money is tight, jobs pay squat and people are really hurting on a month to month basis.
California is the epitome of the Russian hammer and sickle. – HOJ
February 12, 2013 at 1:44 pm
Eric Kirk
Meaning that California is communist?
The state flag does have a red star on it. And a Russian bear!
Technically speaking, the hammer and sickle wasn’t the symbol for Russia, but rather the Soviet Union. Russia was only part of the Soviet Union.
Just saying.
February 12, 2013 at 4:54 pm
Forest Queen
HOJ
. . . and CalPers is the cancer . . .with its GLOBAL GOVERNANCE website, and being the second largest INVESTMENT FIRM in the world, investing a mere 8.2% of its $235 billion assets in California, in particular in California ‘infrastructure,’ labeled “Investment Opportunities” ummmm CalTrans is an “Investment Opportunity.” This inevitably leads to tyranny – no surprises.
CALPERS INVESTS IN MONSANTO! Let me repeat that, CALPERS INVESTS IN MONSANTO!
They are driving the bus via remote control, into a bottomless pit, and all the US Citizens are doing is sticking their head out the window yelling about the bumps in the road, when all they have to do, is get the hell off the bus.
February 12, 2013 at 8:39 pm
"Henchman Of Justice"
Erik, accurate on the Soviet Union prior to the “break-up of the soviet state marriages, although could Prussia suffice? – HOJ
February 12, 2013 at 8:41 pm
"Henchman Of Justice"
Forrest Queen,
and CalPERS wasted/lost much money in real-estate investments. HOJ wrote about the looming real-etstae collapse, but did anyone really listen at any level, nope. Oh well, sometimes poeple learn through losses. – HOJ