IEA Regions 14 & 62 Retired Newsletter An Affiliate Volume 7 Sept 2014

Transcription

1 An Affiliate Volume 7 Sept 2014 REGIONS 14 & 62 IEA-Retired LUNCHEON MEETING Wednesday, September 10th, 2013, at 12 NOON IEA Bloomington Office, 304 S. Eldorado Rd, Suite 2 We would like to invite you to join us for the first meeting of the school year. Our chapter serves retired teachers and ESPs in Region 14 (Bloomington-Normal) and Region 62 (McLean, Livingston, and parts of Woodford Counties). We have varied and interesting programs planned for you this year; mark your calendars and save the dates. Meetings will start at 11:30 AM, except this time. Note that we have a new location for our meetings this year. *NOTE THE CHANGE IN TIME (FOR THIS MEETING ONLY) AND THE CHANGE IN LOCATION* September 10 TRS and Insurance Update Rich Frankenfeld, TRS Director of Community Outreach Lunch from Avanti s. Time change for this meeting only to accommodate our speaker s schedule. November 12 Opportunities for Retirees Colleen Reynolds from HCC Senior Services Programming and Colleen Steinberg from YWCA RSVP Program. Lunch from Jason s Deli. January 14 Planting the Seeds of Learning Through Stories Dr. Mike Lockett, educator, storyteller, children s author. (Rescheduled from last year s cancellation.) Lunch from Potbelly. March 11 Social Media What is It, How to Use It, Identity Security Sarah Antonacci, IEA Communications Department. (Rescheduled from last year s cancellation.) Lunch from Rosatti s. May 13 Falling, Fire Safety, and tour of special airport needs at Fire Station #6 on CIRA site Captain McCullom (after lunch from Bandanna s and meeting at the IEA office) *********************************************************************** MEAL RESERVATIONS Note the change This year we will be having our meals catered by a different restaurant at each meeting. You can join us for lunch, bring your own lunch, or come to the meeting/program and skip lunch or eat before you come. However, no matter which you plan to do, please call or our Reservations Chair, Elaine Cunningham at or cunnghm@gmail.com so we can order enough food, set up and be ready for enough people, and know who to call if we have to cancel the meeting. The price will continue at $7. Contact Elaine no later than Monday, Sept. 8 with your name and YES include me in the food order or NO I won t be eating the ordered food but will be at the meeting. Chapter website - IEA website

2 Chapter Leaders for President Lou Ann Jacobs , Vice-President Jan Meadows , School Supply Project Jan Meadows Reservations Elaine Cunningham Legislative Vickie Mahrt Newsletter & website Janet Kilgus Mailings and nametags Martha Fritcher Region Office Associate Staff Secretary Madelon Newsom Treasurer Donald Gibb Past President Janet Kilgus , Committee Chairs: Region Council Rep for Region 14 Camille Taylor, Jan Meadows, Pat Fitzgerald, Janet Kilgus Region Council Rep for Region 62 Lou Ann Jacobs, Margaret Bratcher, Janet Kilgus Program Committee Officers, committee chairs, Tom Dunavin, Camille Taylor Important Reminder Please let Lou Ann Jacobs know at or if you have any changes in your address, phone number, or address. We can t stay in touch with you if we don t have the correct information. Newsletters by If you get this newsletter via US mail, please consider receiving your newsletter via . It saves us postage, saves paper, and helps keep our Earth Green. Over 100 of our members already get their newsletters electronically. All you need to do is Janet Kilgus at djkilgus@frontier.com and you will be added to the list. Stay Informed Check the IEA website often for the latest legislative developments regarding pensions: and click on the Pensions tab. Members Serving You in IEA and IEA/IEA-Retired Leadership Janet Kilgus is IEA-Retired Chair and Barb Gilhaus is Central Section Rep on the IEA-Retired Council. Janet is also on the IEA Executive Committee and the IPACE Executive Committee. Lou Ann Jacobs is Chair of the IEA-Retired Conference Committee. Vickie Mahrt is Chair of the IEA Local President Support Team and on the Committee Review: Joint Task Force. Sept

3 Stay Connected and Join Our local dues cover the cost of mailings and programs. The chapter membership form is on page 6 of this newsletter. Local dues are only $6 a year and keep you informed about retirement and insurance issues and connected with other retirees. Plus you just might have some fun with us at our meetings good food, interesting programs, up-to-date information on retirement concerns, fellowship, community service, and door prizes. You will also need to join IEA/NEA-Retired and should have received an IEA/NEA-Retired membership form and more in the mail this summer. There are a number of payment options. Let Janet Kilgus (djkilgus@frontier.com) know if you need IEA/NEA-Retired form. With the recent attacks on pensions, you can t afford to not be in our information loop. Contact Lou Ann Jacobs at ljacobs363@aol.com to get on our communications group directory NOW. If you do not have e- mail, find a friend who does and ask them to keep you informed as up-to-date information comes to them via - perhaps provide them with stamps and self-addressed envelopes to make it easy for them to keep you in the loop too. Why Join IEA/NEA Retired Retired membership continues your IEA/NEA Special Services and $1 million liability insurance for work in schools, which is very important if you plan to sub, and continuing legal protection, 1. We have an elected IEA Council of Retirees and elected delegates to IEA and NEA RAs. We have a voice! 2. We contribute to IPACE and participate in lobbying and have a vote in recommendation meetings. 3. We serve on Region Councils. 4. Mentor Program mentors future teachers, assists at student conferences, collects used school supplies for auctions at student conferences, and works with campus chapters. 5. Living Library electronic file cabinets of our best teaching ideas, activities, lessons, etc. 6. Conferences annual IEA Retired conference, with CPDUs available, and participate in SLA and other IEA and NEA events 7. We serve as NEA trainers and on TRS Board of Trustees 8. To stay informed at all levels and much, much more. IEA/NEA Retired represents all retirees (certified educators, ESPs, and higher ed) and their interests. WELCOME NEW RETIREES Welcome to those of you who are receiving this newsletter for the first time since retiring in the spring. Congratulations! We hope you will join us and come to our meetings. Local dues are only $6 a year. You also need to join IEA/NEA Retired. There are several payment options: $35 annually, $2.92 a month out of your retirement check, a onetime life retired membership for $300, or life retired membership in 3 installments of $100 each. Contact Janet Kilgus at djkilgus@frontier.com or for more information and the form or get one at our next meeting. Sept

4 A Message from Lou Ann This is my first column to the members of the retired chapter as your new president. I want to first thank Janet Kilgus for her years of service to the chapter as president. She has graciously agreed to continue to do the newsletter and the webpage while also serving as Chair of the IEA Council of Retirees. The chapter officers and committee chairs met in June to plan programs for this year. We hope that you find them of interest and make plans to come to our meetings. Meetings will now be held at the IEA Bloomington office instead of the Moose. This will allow us to have access to technology as needed for programs. The space is large and adaptable to reconfigure to our needs. I invite you to attend our first meeting on September 10. We will be starting at noon with our lunch--a halfhour later than usual in order to accommodate our speaker, Rich Frankenfeld, who will give us an update from TRS on pensions and insurance. Check the details in this newsletter for reservation information. An accurate count is needed to order enough food for those eating lunch that day. If you wish to attend the meeting but not eat the catered meal, you may do so. If your diet requires special foods, please pack your lunch and dine with us. The beauty of meeting in our new space allows us plenty of flexibility! I hope to see all of you on September 10! The IEA Bloomington Office is on the frontage road across Veteran s Parkway from State Farm Corporate Headquarters. Turn off Prospect onto Sterns just past Jim s Steakhouse and take the curve on to Eldorado. IEA is in the middle of the block with plenty of parking in both the front and back of the building and entrances in both places with the back being handicapped accessible. Mary Lou and Keith Hauge Scholarship Contributions Our chapter will continue to collect voluntary donations at our monthly meetings for the IEA-Retired Mary Lou and Keith Hauge Scholarship of $1500 to be presented each year in April at the IEA Representative Assembly to a child of an IEA member who plans to become a teacher. Let s help those who have yet to join the profession in which we spent our lives working. We ll keep you informed of our running-total in contributions. Let s help make a difference. Last year we collected almost $200. SCHOOL SUPPLIES FOR NEEDY STUDENTS We encourage our members to bring school supplies or a couple of dollars to help out. Region 14, Region 62 also contribute to this project and we thank them for their support. The recipient schools have been very appreciative to receive the supplies for their classes. Needed: Kleenex, poster board, markers, colored pencils, stickers, post-it notes, glue sticks, paper, pencils, protractors, and scissors, pocket folders, and crayons. Please fill out the form below and bring to the meeting for the school supply drawing. Name of Deserving School City of School Person to deliver supplies Sept

5 August 2014 Legislative Update from Vickie Mahrt Illinois Supreme Court Decision on Pension Benefits On June 3, the Illinois Supreme court ruled that subsidized health care premiums for retired state employees are protected under the Illinois Constitution. The decision addressed a 2012 law that allowed the state to charge retired workers for health care insurance premiums, which many did not have to pay depending on how long they had worked for the state. Retirees sued, arguing the changes violated a provision in the state constitution that declares pension benefits shall not be diminished or impaired. Attorneys for the state argued the constitution did not specifically protect health care benefits. We conclude that the state s provision of health insurance premium subsidies for retirees is a benefit of membership in a pension or retirement system within the meaning (of the Constitution) and therefore the General Assembly was precluded from diminishing or impairing that benefit, justices wrote in their opinion. This same constitutional clause protecting pension benefits is at the heart our lawsuits challenging broader pension changes lawmakers passed in December, which reduce costs-ofliving increases and raises retirement ages, among other changes. IEA Recommends Candidates for State Office In July, IEA released the list of recommended candidates for state wide office: Governor: Pat Quinn (D) Attorney General: Lisa Madigan (D) Secretary of State: Jesse White (D) Comptroller: Judy Baar Topinka (R) Treasurer: Michael Frerichs (D) Recommendations for General Assembly candidates are in progress. For a complete, up-to-theminute list of recommended candidates, check the IEA website. Re-Elect Governor Quinn! It is true that we have had our differences with Governor Quinn especially on his pension reform agenda - but there are other critical issues at stake in this fall s gubernatorial election which could affect our survival as a union -such as maintaining collective bargaining rights. It is also crucial that we maintain the state income tax at current level in order to increase school funding. If tax revenue is cut, there will be far less money available for our students' programs, our salaries, our jobs and our pensions. Gov. Quinn supports our efforts to protect collective bargaining and to find more revenue for education by maintaining the state income tax levels. His opponent, Bruce Rauner actually wants cuts to state revenue, and he favors anti-union rules similar to those imposed in Wisconsin by his role model Scott Walker. It is clear that Bruce Rauner would be bad for our union, bad for our pensions, and bad for public education in Illinois. Even though Quinn is not perfect, he is clearly the better candidate for us. As the election approaches, we will be calling on all our members active, student and retired to help get Quinn elected. Sept

6 All IEA-Retired members from Regions 14 & 62 are invited to join our chapter. If you are a member of IEA/NEA-R, it doesn t automatically make you a member of our group. Local dues are $6.00, which mainly covers our mailings. Please make checks payable to IEA-R Regions 14/62. Please pay for only one year at a time (Return this form with your check) NAME ADDRESS CITY Zip TELEPHONE NUMBER ADDRESS (Is this a new address yes or no Circle one.) I WISH TO RECEIVE CHAPTER NEWSLETTERS BY: (CHECK ONE) US MAIL (make sure your is included on the address line above) SPECIAL CONCERNS Please mail this form to Donald Gibb, Treasurer, 700 N. Fourth St, Fairbury IL or bring it to a Regions 14 & 62 Chapter meeting. If you have questions about your membership you can call Donald at Sept