ORGANIZATION OF STAFF ANALYSTS220 East 23rd Street ! Suite 707
New York, New York 10010(212) 686-1229 ! www.osaunion.org
OSA EXECUTIVE BOARDChairperson: Robert J. Croghan ! Vice-Chairperson:Thomas Anderson ! Treasurer: Wilfred St. Surin ! Griev-ance Officer: Kimberly Vann ! Corresponding Secretary:Jeanne O’Sullivan ! Recording Secretary: Jay W.Warshofsky ! Delegates-At-Large: Kathleen Gray, RonaldLehman, Dolores Parson
RECENT OSA LABOR HERO AWARD WINNERS2008 OSA’s Late Treasurer Richard Guarino2007 Former OSA General Counsel Joan Stern Kiok2006 OSA’s Field Organizers2005 Lou Albano (AFSCME Local 375), Michael
Collins (TSO), Joe Sperling (SSEU Local 371)2004 Joe Nazario, Sec’y-Treasurer, SSEU Local 3712003 Battalion Chief Tony Morelli, UFOA2002 Brand New Organizers2001 Civil Servants in Emergency Service
he editorial pages of New York's dailynewspapers are not especially friendlyto municipal workers. Carrying water for
New York’s corporations and elites, they dotheir best to pit public and private sectorworkers against each other, attack thebenefits municipal workers and their unionshave fought decades to obtain, and echothe views of conservative think tanks like theManhattan Institute. Politicians are generallyexpected to toe this corporate line. Woeunto those who speak truth to power instead.
Earlier this year, the New York Daily Newseditorial page repeatedly savaged StateSenator Diane Savino of Staten Island, whoheads the Senate's Civil Service and PensionCommittee.
What had she done to draw their ire?She had simply objected, eloquently, to thedrumbeat call of the mayor and governor,amplified by the media, for a new andworse pension Tier 5 for city and stateemployees. She had dared to point out thata new pension tier would save no moneyimmediately, since only new employeeswould be affected. Instead, she noted, thecurrent fiscal crisis was being used as anexcuse to attack hard-won benefits and tolower the long term cost of the civil serviceworkforce.
The Daily News chose to label the Senatora liar, even when the Independent BudgetOffice also objected to the mayor's claim ofimmediate savings from Tier 5.
Senator Savino stood her ground andproved herself, once again, a friend ofworking New Yorkers.
The Senator is our hero and she should bethe hero of all New Yorkers who care aboutmaintaining a strong middle class. She is
fighting for fair and honest treatment forcivil servants – and she is fighting to helpensure the city we all love does not becomepurely a playground for the wealthy. Themore rich publishers fume, the more weknow how special she is.
For many years, Assemblyman Peter J.Abbate has been a staunch advocate forworking New Yorkers as chair of the Assem-bly Committee on Governmental Employees.
Earlier this year, the Organization ofStaff Analysts joined other municipal unionsin reaching out to Assemblyman Abbate inopposition to the Department of CitywideAdministrative Services’ plan for reclassify-ing an enormous number of civil service jobsfrom competitive class civil servants to ex-empt or non-competitive "patronage" jobs.No testing of merit and fitness needed forthese special folks. More than 3,200 werefor jobs that sounded a whole lot like ana-lyst jobs, except they would have no civilservice protection, probably no union rights,and could be appointed and fired at will.
Assemblyman Abbate assured us he willkeep a vigilant eye on this and a host ofequally corrupt proposals by DCAS aimedat reverting to the hire-at-will, fire-at-willstyle of city government of the 1800's.
Most legislators don’t know what’s wrongwith these proposals, but AssemblymanAbbate does. We are fortunate to have himin defense of a strong civil service system.
Peter Abbate and Diane Savino arefriends of New York workers. They arefighting the good fight.
For these reasons and more, the Organi-zation of Staff Analysts is proud to nameSenator Savino and Assemblyman Abbateour labor heroes of 2009.
