Mulgrew, and his Unity Political Machine, did nothing to STOP Tier 6.
They rolled over when it was proposed in 2011. And when finally enacted in 2012. Now, we are left to pick up the pieces. Struggling to glue back and fix the damage they allowed to happen.
We are exhausted, but hopefully not permanently damaged, by Mulgrew’s decade and a half of pension and healthcare givebacks. Even while he shamelessly grandstands claiming that we are always winning somehow.
The truth is, we are in the struggle of our lives to try to FIX Tier 6 because more than 10 years ago he did nothing to STOP TIER 6.
Lost in Mulgrew’s trademark verbal acrobatics and rhetoric about trying to FIX Tier 6, along with his snail’s pace, piecemeal lobbying campaign, is the fact that he dropped the ball. We’re here because he failed to organize us to use our collective union power to STOP the agenda to deplete our pension benefits.
We were NOT caught off guard. Bloomberg and Cuomo telegraphed their Tier 6 intentions. It wasn’t a surprise. It was a long time coming.
Bloomberg had asked for deep cuts to our pension and healthcare, circa 2008-2009. He stopped negotiating contracts with our city’s unions, not long after. By 2013, a hundred percent of city labor contracts expired. His anti-union agenda to cut our pensions became his ultimatum to the city’s labor unions.
Bloomberg then furiously lobbied in Albany. He got some of what he wanted with the short-lived Tier 5 with Governor Paterson, in 2009. Then he got it all when Cuomo acquiesced, announcing he was proposing a major pension overhaul by introducing Tier 6 in his budget proposal in June of 2011.
For the ten months before its passage in April of 2012, there were no organized UFT rallies. No large scale, coordinated lobbying campaign coming out of 52 Broadway. Not even a single UFT resolution was passed against it by the executive board or delegate assembly during the year before Tier 6 was enacted. Next to nothing in Mulgrew’s web communiques to members before — and only after the legislature passed the new pension reform.
There was no major UFT-centered action, mobilization or pushback whatsoever to STOP TIER 6 — which still threatens the financial futures of a generation of educators today and has led to a mass exodus within our profession.
You’ll find little to nothing in the mainstream press archives containing any public remarks by Mulgrew against Tier 6 prior to its passage. No prominent mentions about it on our union website during this time. He skirted his fiduciary duties and let Dick Ianuzzi and Anthony Pallotta of NYSUT be the primary mouthpieces to speak out against the proposal while the UFT communicated little about a ‘Stop Tier 6’ fight. All while it posed an existential threat to our UFT union family.
In fact, in early 2012, when Mulgrew shared his annual January testimony to Albany’s legislature about the proposed budget, Mulgrew only dedicated a small fraction of his time to say he only had “strong reservations” about the “idea that we need a new pension tier.“
Strong reservations about the idea? That’s it?
That’s it. Mulgrew shrugged.
Unity insiders have confided, in hindsight, that they believed Mulgrew when he told them behind closed doors that the defined pension benefits were in jeopardy. They say there was a sense of inevitability about the looming draconian changes and so they maintained a business as usual posture.
Perhaps Mulgrew miscalculated that if Albany gave Bloomberg what he wanted, Bloomberg would finally negotiate contracts with the city’s unions once again? If so, the gamble failed miserably as Bloomberg left office while the city’s labor contracts, including ours, remained expired.
Even in more recent years, we’ve heard folks like UFT treasurer and TRS teacher-member Trustee, Tom Brown, continue to downplay the severity of the Tier 6 giveback, as evident in a 2022 executive board meeting where “Brown and other Unity-elected members made the argument that Tier 6 was essentially fine, better than what (the mostly non-unionized) rest of the country has, and that improvements are being made anyways.”
Brown went on to falsely claim that “Tier 6ers don’t have ‘less net compensation’ than Tier 4ers.”
After Tier 6 passed in April of 2012, Mulgrew, to his credit, refused to receive an award with Bloomberg and Cuomo at a SOMOS gala, shortly after. Something about the optics of attending a party and being really mad.
What must we do now?
We have little choice. We must continue to organize in our fight to Fix Tier 6.
But we also have the power of our voices, actions and ballot. We need to vote for union leaders that will fight against the erosion of our pension and healthcare benefits. Vote against those who have sold us out.
On May 8th, active TRS members have an opportunity to vote for a new TRS teacher member trustee. The board trustees have pension fund oversight and an opportunity to influence the direction of our pension.
We can no longer trust Mulgrew and his political machine who have allowed our benefits to be gutted for personal gain. His lack of leadership has hurt us and our families.
Vote for Ben Morgenroth for TRS teacher-member board trustee. He’s the only candidate that offers independent oversight and that is also a rank and file Tier 6 educator. Unlike his opponent, a UFT paid staffer who was part of the Mulgrew machine in 2012 that did nothing significant to fight against stopping the destructive path of Tier 6.
Ben is the only candidate with financial experience as a former investment fund risk analyst that can keep our pensions safe and secure. He is hands down the most qualified candidate, has the confidence to stand up and say, “FIX TIER NOW, NOT LATER!”. Most importantly, Ben will stand with us against the establishment who sell out our benefits, time and time again.
Let’s drain the Mulgrew swamp.
Please consider making a $5 donation to the Ben4TRS grassroots campaign. Click here to donate.
At the recent Retiree Chapter meeting Tom Brown spoke about the “Three legged stool”
of retirement benefits: Defined Benefit pension, TDA and Social Security.
There actually was a “four legged stool” the three he cited and Medicare, Medicare supplement at no cost and Medicare Part B reimbursement but the UFT and MLC cut that leg off!
Mike Bloomberg, long time Republican, took office as a Democrat, and systematically took apart labor gains of fifty or more years. He broke unions, continuing his horrific influence by draining the UFT retirees funding via his proxy, Michael Mulgrew, who passively looks on as Charter schools proliferated without in-place labor agreements. He agreed to drain one billion in retirees’ funds to pay for a teeny new labor agreement, salary. 3%???