December 12, 2025 — With PEF’s 2023-2026 PS&T contract ending April 1, 2026, the Contract Committee is gearing up for negotiations at a time when uncertainty seems rampant at every level of government.
At the start of the current millennium, the 1999 PEF Contract had long expired, and members had spent hundreds of days working without a new contract. So on January 5, 2000 — the 279th day without a new contract — they decided to make some noise.
PEF organized a protest of 20,000 members to rally in Albany, hoping to attract the attention of then-Governor George Pataki. Members of PEF were joined in solidarity by thousands of members from CSEA. In response, the governor mobilized 300 troopers to the State Capitol.
“Our members refused to be intimidated by an army of state and local police who were clearly under orders to try to muzzle us,” said then-PEF President Roger Benson. “Our members came to personally deliver their own message to the governor — ‘Give us a Fair Contract Now!’ — while he was presenting his State of the State address at the Capitol.”
In standing up to the Governor and making their case in the media, PEF eventually came to terms on a strong retroactive contract that governed uion members’ terms and conditions of employment through 2003.
