Others Take Action While the NYC Council Remains ‘Inert’ on Retiree Protections
Legislation aimed at protecting retiree healthcare from being privatized and diminished still only has 18 co-sponsors in the New York City Council.
By Joe Maniscalco
A strange case of “inertia” continues to grip the New York City Council this week where Intro. 1096—the bill aimed at shielding retiree healthcare from being diminished in the event of what Mayor Eric Adams calls “evolving conditions”—continues to languish.
Indeed, it’s almost as if the door is being purposely left open to push retired city workers into a profit-driven Medicare Advantage plan at some point in the future—despite the mayor’s sudden announcement in June that he is abandoning the plan. But no one has the guts to shut it.
Council Member Chris Marte [D-1st District] warns that “at any moment, this mayor or a future mayor can reverse positions and try again to put retirees on Medicare Advantage or an equally dangerous plan.” He wants his bill to finally get a hearing and see it become law.
Intro. 1096, however, still only has 18 co-sponsors, and mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani won’t talk about it except to say he’s against Medicare Advantage and that the bill wouldn’t be needed if he’s elected.
Now contrast that situation to what the heads of several labor unions representing New York City Transit workers are doing in opposition to the greater Medicare Advantage push happening nationwide.
Last year, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority [MTA] succeeded in pressing TWU Local 100 into accepting Medicare Advantage after cementing an earlier contract deal many considered a “sellout” agreement. The MTA now stands to save a reported $73 million annually by having TWU Local 100 retirees in a profit-driven Medicare Advantage health insurance plan.
TWU Local 100 retirees opposed to the Medicare Advantage push continue to fight back in court, however. Administrative Judge Shahabuddeen Ally reportedly set a July 11 deadline for all parties to submit new briefs following the New York State Court of Appeals’ June 18 ruling against New York City retirees also fighting back against the Medicare Advantage push.
“Yes, we changed our constitution and bylaws that clearly state that no president—now or in the future—can ever give up our secondary coverage of Medicare.”
That’s the same verdict Mayor Adams applauded as “an important precedent that will allow the city to modify plans in response to evolving conditions,” just two days prior to officially dropping the Medicare Advantage push—at least for now.
Attorneys for the MTA, meanwhile, reportedly missed Judge Ally’s July 11 deadline to submit new briefs. According to TWU Local 100R President Lloyd Archer, the MTA’s attorneys did not enter their brief until July 22.
TWU Local 106 President Philip Valenti saw the way the Medicare Advantage push was headed last year, and decided to push back hard. The union, representing 1,400 Level 2 station supervisors, maintenance line supervisors and other MTA employees, revised its constitution and bylaws to expressly prohibit the termination of members’ Traditional Medicare benefits.
Mike Carrube, head of the Subway-Surface Supervisors Association, and his union of more than 4,000 members took similarly decisive action earlier this year, writing protective language into their own constitution and bylaws to persevere the Traditional Medicare benefits of their members.
“Yes, we changed our constitution and bylaws that clearly state that no president—now or in the future—can ever give up our secondary coverage of Medicare,” Carrube recently told Work-Bites. “That passed overwhelmingly, of course, and rightfully so. I could be here now standing for one thing and then some president comes in behind me and decides, ‘Nah…I'm okay with this—let me give this up.’ Then all of a sudden everybody who's retired gets a letter in the mail [telling them they’re in a Medicare Advantage plan]. I didn’t want that to happen.”
The SSSA remains in contract talks with the MTA, but Carrube says Medicare Advantage is off the table.
“We’re not doing it,” he said. “It’s over, and we’re moving on with the contract.”
Thinking nationally, Carrube says the entire labor movement “should be united” against the Medicare Advantage push across the country.
“First of all, the government should not be trying to take away our Medicare at age 65, which we paid for from day one when we started to work,” Carrube said. “Whether we were 15, 16, 18, 20, or 50 when we started to work—we were paying into that. So, at age 65 we're entitled to a federally—funded Medical plan, which is Medicare. You bring in these Medicare Advantage plans—which is offered by a private company—now you have problems. A private company is now administering this to you and when you need critical care they have the right to turn you down.”
Dr. Nancy Tomes, writing in the New England Journal of Medicine earlier this month, talks about the “broken promises” of profit-driven healthcare and how the model "created the profit opportunity that enticed corporate stakeholders to invest in health care” way back in the 1970s and 1980s.
“But as the corporate presence increased,” she writes, “physicians lost control of their business model. The ‘tail’ of financialization began wagging the ‘dog’ of medical practice. That shift coincided with corporate cooptation of the language of consumerism to justify these changes as in patients’ best interests. In the process, physicians and patients lost economic autonomy over health care choices.”
“Let’s call it what it is,” Carrube added. “It could be your spouse. It could be you. You can't be running around hoping that you're going to get approved for some surgery or some kind of treatment when your life is on the line. So, I think the whole labor movement should be united on this, whether it affects you [directly] or it doesn't affect you [directly].”