Campaign brings in 4,000 new members in two years with boost from AFSCME


By GREGORY N. HEIRES

The Retirees Association of DC 37 has added 4,000 new members to its ranks since 2001 thanks to an organizing drive, greater activism and the customary signing up by retiring city workers.

The Association had about 21,000 members in 2001 before the group sent out two recruitment letters to former city employees who had been represented by DC 37. Recently, membership hit 25,000.

The association sent these mailings in 2001 and 2002 with the support of DC 37’s parent union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. “I think that our new members joined because they were impressed with our track record, and they understand the importance of being tied to a strong organization,” said Stuart Leibowitz, who is serving his first term as the Association’s president. “AFSCME’s backing of the direct mailing — which we couldn’t have afforded on our own — helped tremendously,” he said.

Perhaps the greatest achievements of the Retirees Association in recent years were its successful lobbying for an annual pension cost of living increase and for a local law requiring the city to fully reimburse most city employees for their contributions to their Medicare Part B premiums.

As part of its effort to fight more aggressively for retiree issues, the association has sought to increase its visibility within DC 37 and the labor movement. The association supported a DC 37 constitutional amendment adopted last year that made the retirees’ president a non-voting member of the DC 37 Executive Board.

Last year, Mr. Leibowitz was also elected president of the New York City Central Labor Council’s chapter of the AFL-CIO’s Alliance for Retired Americans, which represents 250,000 local retired union workers. Besides building up its membership, the association aims to improve its representation of retirees by playing an important role in the AFL-CIO’s effort to revitalize the labor movement by recruiting new members and building the political power of the union movement.

The group will also fight for health care issues, including a Medicare prescription drug benefit, and the preservation of Social Security against the threat of privatization.

“The unions see their retirees as a source of continuing strength, especially as their own numbers decline and retiree numbers increase,” Mr. Leibowitz said. For their part, Mr. Leibowitz said, “retirees attempt to convince the active employees that they are ‘retirees-in-training,’ and that any cutback in an existing retiree benefit today represents a cutback in the active employees’ benefit structure tomorrow.”