Public Employee Press

From deficit to surplus

By MAF MISBAH UDDIN
Treasurer, District Council 37

I AM happy to report that DC 37 has a budgeted surplus for the first time since 2005.

A year ago, the DC 37 Executive Board approved a budgeted deficit of $4.9 million, but now our current budget projects that we will end this year with a surplus of nearly $700,000.

Strict financial controls that we have introduced over the years are finally paying off.

And more recently, our financial health has been helped by an improved investment climate, a small growth in our membership and an increase in the "per capita" rebate authorized by our parent union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Our per capita is that portion of member dues retained by DC 37 after AFSCME and the locals receive their share.

The 2014 expense budget is $37.6 million. That represents an 11.1 percent decrease from the $42.3 million approved budget for 2013.

The 2014 spending plan includes the $37.6 million budgeted for expenses and a separate capital budget of $435,200.

Personnel savings

Basically, four factors account for our improved financial condition.

• Personnel cost reductions: Our current personnel costs are $33.3 million, which is $6.5 million less than last year. These costs include salaries; automobile and expense allowances; employee fringe benefits and post-retirement benefit obligations for health care (PBO).

• Union income increase: The increase of the mandated AFSCME per capita rebate has added $750,000 to the union's budgeted projected income.
• Membership growth: After years of downsizing by the city, the union projects an increase of 2,000 new members last year. The additional union dues have added $750,000 to our budgeted income.
• Cost savings: We adopted a number of financial controls several years ago that are helping us hold down our expenses. These include creating a capital budget and tightly monitoring expenditures on conventions, staff training, union conferences and other items.
  

Our capital budgets have helped us plan for major purchases of new equipment - computer hardware, furniture and carpeting - more carefully.

This etter planning has helped us reduce spending on routine maintenance and unexpected major equipment purchases.

Important improvements in the union's functioning are included in the capital budget: We have a digital scanning project, which will make our recordkeeping more efficient. And we are adopting a new grievance-tracking system that will help with us provide members with services more efficiently.

This budget is the result of a lot of hard work. I would like to thank the accounting staff. The union's division and department directors and assistant directors provided invaluable help.

I would like to take this opportunity to comment on Hurricane Sandy, which as you know delivered a devastating blow to our building and forced us to operate outside of our headquarters for months.

We addressed the damages through our reserves, so the hurricane did not have an impact on our expense budget. The cost of the repairs came in substantially below our original estimate. We are applying for assistance from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to cover some of the Sandy-related expenses.

So, we're back in business after Sandy. We came out of that crisis more united and stronger. We are no longer operating in the red. And we look forward to an exciting year as we fight to win a new contract, gear up for the November elections and step up our efforts to enforce workplace protections for members.