ALBANY — New York State has reached a retroactive one-year labor agreement with the New York State Public Employees Federation. PEF is one of the largest unions in the United States and is New York’s second-largest state-employee union, representing 54,000 workers.
“After negotiating in good faith, we have reached an agreement with PEF that protects the rights of our state’s workforce and New York taxpayers,” Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo said. “This agreement aligns PEF’s contract with other state labor contracts, while continuing the trend of fiscal responsibility in New York.”
“I applaud Governor Cuomo for the cooperative and fair approach his team demonstrated at the bargaining table,” PEF President Wayne Spence said. “We appreciate the Governor’s recognition of his valuable workforce and the way each union member helps to make New York the great state that it is.”
The one-year contract agreement includes a two percent salary increase retroactive to April 1, 2015. This agreement brings into line PEF with other state union contracts, including CSEA, UUP, NYSCOPBA, Council 82, DC-37 Housing and GSEU. The agreement must be ratified with PEF’s executive board in May. The cost of the agreement is $73 million.
The contract agreement also resolves the longstanding issue of the fingerprinting of PEF employees working in the New York State Office of Information Technology Services. Prior to the agreement, PEF filed a grievance with the Public Employment Relations Board which blocked ITS from fingerprinting PEF-represented employees. The agreement allows for current and future PEF employees working at ITS to be fingerprinted due to the sensitive nature of information accessible within the department.
