SEAG1199

Income Protection
Has Arrived

with our new Short & Long Term Disability Benefits Programs!

Available NOW for members only*

* Membership will be verified before you can take advantage of this benefit, so if you’re not a member in good standing, rejoin today and put your membership dues to work right away.

SEAG Does Make a Difference!

Message from the Director, Jack Seddon

There are some who say SEAG can’t make a difference. Not only is this assumption untrue, it is without foundation. To make change, to meet goals and objectives, many battles must be fought on many fronts. In our case, it means battles fought through collective bargaining, lobbying and litigation, all of which do not come without its up and downs, time, energy and money.

During this past legislative session, all state employees were under the gun . This was especially so for SES employees from whom the legislature, in its infinite wisdom, saw fit to once again extract an extra pound of flesh.

This legislature wanted to have SES employees begin to pay the same health insurance premium share as Career Service employees. Additionally, it wanted to dramatically amend the economic terms of the DROP plan and, adding insult to injury for state- employed attorneys, prohibit a state agency from reimbursing or paying for attorney bar dues.

SEAG was instrumental in its lobbying effort to dramatically reduce, but not eliminate, an SES employee’s contribution for health insurance, in having the Governor veto the changes to the retirement plan, including the DROP plan, and SEAG is now, in conjunction with the Florida Prosecuting Attorney’s Association and the Florida Public Defender Association, challenging the legislature’s prohibition of payment of Florida Bar dues by agencies only through “proviso” language in the Appropriations Act. This prohibition clearly nullifies the authority of agencies to pay bar dues granted by Section 216.345, Florida Statutes, effectively amending that statute through the Appropriations Act in violation of the Florida Constitution.

Make no mistake about it, SEAG is your organization, an organization that continues to address your concerns, as it always has, through collective bargaining, lobbying and litigation. If you are not a member of SEAG, consider joining your colleagues and support the organization that supports you – we have another tough year ahead of us.

As you hear more and more about “health care reform,” from the news, from your doctors, from your employers, it can become confusing, and you want to be sure you’re making the right decisions for you and your family.

To help you stay informed, we now feature sections that contain a variety of information that you might be interested in.

With all the resources available, and limited time to devote to sifting through it all, we try to put together a good mix of information and resources that can help you move forward in our 21st century health care system.

If you have a topic you want to see posted, or would like to know more about, please contact lyndafpd@aol.com.

The State Employees Attorneys Guild (SEAG) is a division of the Federation of Physicians & Dentists/Alliance of Healthcare & Professional Employees (FPD/AHPE), a non-profit organization representing public and private employees. The organization is dedicated to improving the working conditions of its members.

In 1993, a group of Florida state attorneys from Pensacola to Key West petitioned the Public Employees Relations Commission (PERC) for the right to organize SEAG. The State of Florida filed objections, arguing that state attorneys should not have the right to collectively bargain. The Attorney General didn’t want to give up its unilateral control over changes in our wages, benefits and working conditions.

From 1993 to 1999, SEAG successfully appealed to the Circuit Court, Appeals Court and the Florida Supreme Court. And on May 20, 1999, the Supreme Court ruled that public-employed attorneys have the constitutional right to organize a union.

So, for the purpose of protecting our rights as state employees and to promote our professional interests, SEAG was formed. As SEAG, we affiliated with the FPD/AHPE because it represents state-employed physicians, and we felt the issues they have with the state are akin to ours.

SEAG recognizes the critical relationship between professional employees and their employers: each has a profound effect and influence on the other and on the standards of quality and care within their professions. Achieving professional standards of quality in and of itself is a fundamental tenet of SEAG’s mission and goal.

SEAG, as a division of FPD/AHPE, is affiliated with the National Union of Hospital & Healthcare Employees (NUHHCE) and with the American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees (AFSCME)/AFL-CIO. As such, SEAG is part of the largest union organization in the world, an organization which has been working for over fifty years to better the lives of its members and to achieve the dignity which, as professionals, they deserve.