PEP, June 2012: Mail and Media

Public Employee Press

Mail and Media

District Council 37 is the fightback union
Tier 6 passes, and DC 37 goes to work to save members from its disastrous cuts. We sign up 20,000 members in Tier 4.

The mayor loses prevailing wage cases, our blue-collar workers get good raises and 10 years of back pay, so Bloomie launches an attack aimed at cutting their pay by changing the rules midgame.

Lillian Roberts and our union lawyers go to court and the judge slaps down the mayor's attempt to cheat.

We have been fighting back effectively, but now is the time for us to go on the attack against this billionaire mayor who cares nothing for working people or the communities where we live.

The local Congress members' demand for an investigation of Bloomberg's use of federal money on crooked contracting - which Lillian Roberts pushed for - could send him out of City Hall in well-deserved handcuffs.

— SARAH GREEN
Local 1549

Questions on generic drugs and Lipitor
I received the May 2012 PEP and there is some misinformation regarding the coverage of generic versions of popular prescriptions. I recently had a prescription for generic Lipitor filled at my local CVS and had to pay a copay of $75 for 30 pills, more than I paid for the brand name.

I called DC 37 and was told that Lipitor is "not covered."

Your article is misleading in that it states that the copay is only $5 for generics, including Lipitor. What is accurate? Is Lipitor (generic) covered or not? If so, why $75?

— JANET MANFREDONIA
Admin. Ass. II, Local 384

Editor's note: There is a lot of confusion about the price of the new generic equivalent of Lipitor, which does cost almost as much as the branded Lipitor.

Currently, there is only one manufacturer of this "sole source" generic drug. For its first six months, to offset the cost of developing the new generic, the manufacturer is allowed to price the drug higher than other generics. The price is expected to fall considerably as more firms start making generic Lipitor.

During the six-month "exclusivity period," the "sole-source" generics are treated as brand-name drugs and members are required to pay the brand drug copay ($35) plus an ancillary charge based on the difference between the ingredient costs of the brand and
generic versions.

Members who chose to remain on a brand-name cholesterol-lowering drug were advised of these costs in advance. Members were also told that copays were lowered to $0 for other generic statins.

Warns of cancer and radiation with gas produced by fracking
Our members should be alerted to a project that has Mayor Bloomberg's blessing, for supplying natural gas to residents and businesses in the five boroughs: The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission is poised to issue a permit to Spectra Energy Corporation subsidiary Texas Eastern Pipeline for a natural gas pipeline, to extend across the Hudson from New Jersey, into and through Manhattan's Gansvoort Peninsula, to bring us Marcellus Shale fracked gas from Pennsylvania and (Bloomberg and Cuomo hope) upstate New York.

What these politicians seem to be ignorant of is that this fracked gas, the fuel, methane, will be rich in carcinogenic Radon 222, which comes as a by-product with the methane, from deep underground rock. This is certain to fill our kitchens when we cook, and then our lungs, ultimately causing cases of lung cancer, according to experts in the field of radioactive substances. The methane is intended not only for cooking but also for heating our homes and apartments, as our public agencies move building owners to switch away from using highly polluting No. 6 heating oil.

It is commonly known that radon gas is plentiful at ground level in upstate New York, and there is radon in our kitchens even now, but the radon coming up from the depths in the Marcellus gas wells has a concentration at the wellhead of up to 70 times the average concentration in natural gas wells throughout the United States.

— ARNOLD FROGEL
Retired Consumer Affairs Senior
Inspector, Local 1759

Thanks for unions
I thank God for the unions, especially DC 37.

It's chilling to think what big cities would be like without us.

I received my PEP last week and I was so happy I was once part of DC 37 - old and retired though I may be now. I have to wonder what would happen to the coming generation if the unions didn't exist.

For years Ms. Roberts has hammered away in her white papers about waste and corruption. Do you hear the message now, Mr. Bloomberg?

I just love all of you, and may God continue to bless you all with the insight to expose all this corruption while the rich grow richer and the poor working men and women suffer and struggle just to keep getting by.

— DOLORES WILLIAMS
Retiree