Page 9 - Work Force December 2016

CSEA’s Zabinski featured in Women Working calendar
SYRACUSE — Add “calendar star” to the growing list of accomplishments for Central Region activist Kathy Zabinski.
She is featured in the Workforce Development Institute’s 2017 Women Working Calendar along with other women labor activists across the state.
Zabinski,
who not only
serves as the
Onondaga
County Local
president, but
serves as the
Central Region
treasurer and
a Greater
Syracuse
Labor Council
board member.
She is also a 2015 graduate of CSEA’s Labor Education and Development (LEAD) Program.
Zabinski, who works as a sergeant of corrections at Onondaga County’s Jamesville Correctional Facility, said she was honored to be included.
“I was extremely humbled and
honored to be chosen for this calendar,” she said. “I just look at myself as a union officer, making sure our members’ rights are not being infringed upon or violated.”
That’s a daily task for Zabinski, who for years has been dealing with a very labor-unfriendly county administration. She recently ended
a more than three-year battle to settle a contract for her members, which included bringing charges against Onondaga County for imposing an
illegal contract.
“It’s a daily issue, based on our
administration, where they feel it’s OK to step on workers’ rights on a regular basis,” she said.
It’s also one of the reasons she was nominated to appear in the calendar.
Zabinski
“Kathy is committed to help
all workers as you will see her at countless labor events, work pickets and community rallies,” read the nomination letter. “She has proven herself against the odds as a female representative in a male-dominated profession within corrections. All her efforts are about ensuring that her union brothers and sisters are
supported, protected and able to provide for their families.”
Zabinski will be honored at an Albany-area reception for the union women featured in the calendar.
You can request a calendar by emailing calendar@wdiny.org.
— Mark M. Kotzin
Members reject Westchester contract proposal
WHITE PLAINS — Westchester County Unit members have overwhelmingly rejected an eight- year contract proposal, refusing an offer that would have ended the protracted negotiations that have been ongoing since the end of 2011.
The rejected tentative agreement had included wage increases aimed to offset newly-introduced health insurance premium contributions. While County Executive Rob Astorino’s spokesperson later called out CSEA members as unwilling to make premium contributions, many workers
said the real issue was that the contribution levels proposed would unfairly affect some of the county’s lowest-paid workers.
spoken; they have screamed their rejection to the county’s settlement offer,” CSEA Westchester County Unit President Kwabena Manu said. “County Executive Astorino and his advisers should know by this vote that the members of CSEA demand and expect fair treatment.”
CSEA’s lead negotiator, Labor Relations Specialist Larry Sparber, has contacted county officials
to review both sides’ next steps. Meanwhile, union leaders and staff are working to further engage unit members in the negotiations process by seeking additional member input and increasing communications.
— Jessica Ladlee
“Our members have not just
Why I will
NEVER Quit
“Everything that I have was given to me by collective bargaining and by my union, and I will make sure that I will preserve it and help my fellow union members as much as humanly possible until I exhaust every strength in my bones.”
— Evans Quamina, Metropolitan Developmental Disabilities Services Office Local President
December 2016
The Work Force 9
“I was extremely humbled and honored to be chosen for this calendar. I just look at myself as a union officer, making sure our members’ rights are not being infringed upon or violated.”