MADISON, WI (WTAQ) – A state committee has unanimously endorsed the first pay raise in six years for Wisconsin state troopers.
But the Legislature’s Joint Committee on Employment Relations refused Tuesday to give raises to many other state workers who got 1 percent pay hikes in each of the last two years.
The panel did approve a newly negotiated contract that gives members of the troopers’ union 3 percent pay hikes for each of the last two fiscal years. That’s after a 17 percent average raise was tossed aside in March.
Although talks have not started on a new deal, State Patrol union members still get the 6 percent total pay hikes carried over come July 1st. In exchange, they’ll have to pay more for their health insurance.
Most other state employees had to do the same under Act 10, but the patrol officers were exempt from the near elimination of collective bargaining for other public unions.
The contract still needs approval from the full Legislature. But that’s considered a formality, since the leaders of both houses sit on the committee.
The panel voted 7-2 not to increase wages for 31,000 other state employees for the next two years. No money for such pay hikes was included in Governor Scott Walker’s proposed state budget.
Democrats and union leaders say the freeze is actually a pay cut, due to increases in the workers’ health insurance costs.
(Story courtesy of Wheeler News Service)
