Legislative Alert: January 10, 2025
President's Message
A 2025 Unified Union Agenda
On behalf of the 2.5 million union members and their families that make up the NYS AFL-CIO, I wish everyone a happy, healthy, and safe new year. We have a lot of work ahead of us, as we continue to face global strife, ongoing healthcare crises, climate, and energy challenges, and dramatic technological change that is reshaping every aspect of our lives. We face housing, education, and socio-economic unfairness that cause poverty and prevent working families from living with decency and dignity.
The union movement is on the path to addressing many of these issues: among our achievements, we have won strong clean energy goals to address climate change while ensuring we create good union jobs; this year, the minimum wage increased, and, every year, it will be indexed to inflation to keep up with the cost of living; we improved the Tier 6 public pension system to enhance public services by recruiting and retaining qualified public servants; and we enacted a first-in- the-nation labor protection to ensure that as the state assists in the development of artificial intelligence, we are mindful of the impact on jobs and the quality of public services.
There is still much more to do. We must address child poverty by creating affordable housing, increasing affordable childcare, providing quality education and higher education, and providing access to healthcare for all New Yorkers. We need to address mental health, addiction, and other issues that contribute to poverty. We have to address the chronic staffing shortages throughout our health care system, and we must continue to rebuild our transportation, and other infrastructure needs to meet our clean energy goals. We must do this by including labor standards that ensure all workers who provide these services receive prevailing rate, living wages, and the right to union representation on every publicly funded project and program, including construction, operations/maintenance, and supply chain.
We must build on our past achievements to ensure artificial intelligence is used responsibly and fairly and that those impacted negatively have new opportunities and necessary assistance. We need to shore up our unemployment system which is plagued by a lingering deficit caused by the pandemic and is keeping worker benefits lower than they should be.
We must do all of this while also preparing for dramatic budget and policy changes that could result from federal action. We must ensure that our budget is sound, and we have fair and adequate revenue. New tax brackets for the wealthiest New Yorkers and the extension of corporate and millionaire taxes enacted several years ago should be passed.
Despite these challenges in New York, we have always worked together to address our needs, and I know 2025 will be no different. I look forward to working with everyone this year and offer our best wishes as we address these and the many other challenges ahead.
Mario Cilento, President
Upcoming Meeting
STATE OF THE STATE BREAKFAST MEETING
Tuesday, January 14, 2025, 8:30 a.m. - 11:00 a.m.
This event will be located at the Albany office of the NYS AFL-CIO, 100 South Swan St. Albany, NY.
A light breakfast and refreshments will be served.
Please RSVP to Nagma Singh at [email protected]