February 14, 2025 — When I applied to work at PEF in 2023, I admittedly knew very little about the union. While preparing for my job interview, I learned about the union’s work and who PEF represents, but it wasn’t until I joined the communications team that I found out my family had a PEF connection.
Whenever I start a new job, I call my grandmother. In 2023, when I told her I was hired as a writer for the Public Employees Federation, she reacted with surprise.
“Oh, PEF!” she said. “My union! I love PEF.”
My grandmother, Barbara Pizarro, began working at Bronx Psychiatric on September 22, 1966. The hospital was only three years old. She started as a housekeeper and retired as an intensive case manager after 30 years of State service.
“I stayed on the ward as an aide for many years,” she told me. “But I have always been a learner and I’ve always sought more.”
On the job, Pizarro learned how to give injections, administer medications and other typical nursing duties. It wasn’t long before she was invited to join a “Family Studies Unit” where she worked to assist families with therapy treatment.
“It was an evening clinic, so it was often the whole family,” she recalled. “I always felt my rapport with the families was good, too.”
The unit eventually dissolved, and she moved to a medication research unit, then the education and training department and later a file management position. In 1983, encouraged by her co-workers, she earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology from the College of New Rochelle.
A management shake-up at Bronx Psychiatric increased her job responsibilities. She recalled being asked to file an important report, something she had never actually done.
“I told my supervisor that I’d never put together a report like that before, but that I knew where to find all the information,” Pizarro said. “He told me to do my best.”
“Do your best” is a philosophy Pizarro has always followed. Her grandmother instilled it in her, along with the value and dignity of work.
“She always said to just do your best and be proud of the work you’ve done,” Pizarro said.
Ultimately, the report filed by my grandmother would exceed expectations. Eventually, after being urged by her supervisor, she went back to school and earned a double Master’s degree in Social Work and Administration.
During her career, she rose from a Grade 7 to a Grade 19. When she first entered State service in 1966, she was a member of CSEA, which was considered an “association” and not yet a union. When she reached the professional ranks at Bronx Psychiatric, she joined PEF.
“They called those of us at Tier 1 (of the State pension plan) dinosaurs,” she laughed. “But when I saw what I could potentially get after my years of state service, I knew it was for me.”
Pizarro recalls going to Yonkers to attend an informational membership meeting about her pension benefits. The promise of retiring at 55 impressed her.
“They had someone there who would tell you how much you’d make if you stayed,” she said. “I remember a colleague was unsure about the pension. But they came around once they saw the numbers.”
Later, when Pizarro needed help paying her mortgage, she learned that PEF was a part of the AFL-CIO, who had a benefit to help negotiate mortgage rates. She dropped hers in half thanks to her union membership.
Today, as a PEF retiree, Pizarro is still benefiting from her union.
“Recently, I found out about the Sun Life Insurance through MBP. I signed up because I needed dental,” she said. “Now I have a good dentist that isn’t too far from my home.”
It was at a work reunion last year when she got to tout one final achievement to her old colleagues from Bronx Psychiatric.
“I told them that my grandson works for PEF, and they were all shocked and happy for me,” she said.
My grandmother is hopeful about PEF’s future, and while she knows there may be a difficult road ahead, she says members need to find strength in the fact that they aren’t traveling it alone.
“I know sometimes people do not talk about what is going on at their workplace,” she said. “But I hope, and I know, that PEF can find a way to figure out what is going on in places where people feel afraid to speak up. PEF does a tremendous job based on how many people they represent.”