May 6, 2025 — At a Telephone Town Hall held on April 16, PEF President Wayne Spence invited staff directors from the Departments of Civil Service Enforcement/Research, Membership Information Systems, Legislative, Statewide Field Services and Contract Administration to address the thousands of PEF members on the line.
Director of Civil Service Enforcement/Research Veronica Foley briefed them on the total compensation study the New York State Department of Civil Service (DCS) began in March 2025. It was commissioned at the urging of PEF and other unions almost two years ago as a way to assess how competitive the state’s compensation package is with the private sector and is being administered by Deloitte Consulting.
“What the state has outlined for Deloitte to do is conduct a full and thorough review of the state’s total compensation structure,” said Foley. “What they’re going to be looking at goes beyond base salaries.”
The study will also compare salary add-ons, as well as leave and retirement benefits to see how they compare and compete with the private sector. One-thousand State titles were chosen by DCS to serve as the benchmark for Deloitte to determine “alignment and competitiveness.”
“Once this review is done, they’re going to assess how those titles line up with employers of similar size in the public and private sectors,” said Foley. “They’re also going to be looking at required levels of education. They’re using what’s already based in law to see how we stack up with other employers.”
Foley said that there will be a review of turnover rates as well, as limiting turnover is one of the State’s goals when it comes to recruitment and retention of the workforce. Additionally, while the study is ongoing, any requests for salary differentials and salary reallocation will be on pause, a decision that PEF opposes.
“While this study is ongoing, the work does not end. Our department of Civil Service Enforcement and Research has created a toolkit to make sure people understand how salary differential requests and reallocation requests work their way through the state bureaucracy and what the role of each stakeholder is—including PEF,” said Foley.
Members can find the toolkit at PEF.org/CivilService. A recording of an April 30 training about the toolkit will also be available on that page.
Joe Cocci, PEF’s Director of Membership Information Systems (MIS), introduced the PEF app to members on the call.
“The app is now available for download in the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store,” said Cocci. “Complete instructions on how to log in can be found at PEF.org/app.”
Cocci stressed that this is a members’-only app, so there is no need for PEF members to sign up or enroll.
“You log in using your membership identification number (MIN) and the same password you use to log in to the PEF website or the Membership Benefits website,” said Cocci. “It’s that easy.”
Members who do not know their MIN can call PEF from 9-5 weekdays at (800) 342-4306 and the MIS team is developing a MIN lookup tool for the website that is expected to launch this summer.
The legislative and budget section of the call was led by PEF Legislative Director Pat Lyons. Since the call on April 16 a conceptual framework for the New York State Fiscal Year 2025-2026 budget was agreed to by the Governor and the Legislature and the union is waiting on details about its specific budget priorities.
Lyons and President Spence once again stressed the possible impact of federal cuts on State services and urged members to call their members of Congress and tell them why it’s a bad idea. Contact information for the New York Congressional delegation can be found on the PEF website.
“Because the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was unable to generate the $2 trillion in savings that they proposed, it looks as though the Senate and the House are going to pass a the next budget via the budget reconciliation process that would trim at least $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years,” said Lyons. “That is a significant chunk of resources to come out of the federal budget.”
Lyons said that while about $92 billion of New York’s $254 billion budget comes from the federal government, New York is a revenue generator for the entire country, and, until recently, it gave more revenue, benefits, and resources to the federal government than it received back. Any loss in federal money that typically funds Medicaid and the Department of Health could have an impact on hospitals and laboratories in New York. There is an expectation that the state can stay afloat, in some cases, thanks to the state’s money-saving initiatives.
“The state is sitting on about $30 billion in reserves. They have about $20 billion in specified reserves and about $10 billion in cash, so we are in a strong financial position as a state,” said Lyons. “But we have to be clear, there is no way for the state to backfill all of massive cuts that may or may not come about as part of this budget resolution process.”
Before ending his section of the call, Lyons called upon the membership to continue to put pressure on legislators at the federal level, to put a stop to the cuts and not to pass the reconciliation budget as currently drafted.
“There is a number you can call to get in touch with your congressional representative,” said Lyons. “There are also many rallies going on across the state, and we encourage you to go to those rallies when you can. We need a show of force that these cuts are not going to be tolerated and they’re not appropriate.”
The number for the U.S. House of Representatives’ switchboard is (202) 224-3121. Follow the prompts to be connected to your representative. Members can also get involved by sharing testimony and personal videos through PEF’s Stop the Cuts campaign.
Director of Statewide Field Services Katie Vorwald said on the call that while the cuts are already taking shape in New York State, PEF and other unions do not usually hear about them until members do.
“Our limitation is that we do not have granular information about what members are federally funded and what agencies may be planning for particular departments or divisions,” said Vorwald. “What we need is for you to be talking to your PEF leadership, your local stewards, your Labor-Management chair and your field reps to let us know what you’re hearing on the ground.”
So far, PEF is aware of cuts to the State Education Department due to COVID relief funds being taken back from the state, even though the money was to be used until 2026.
For the final piece of the Town Hall, members heard from Director of Contract Administration Debra Greenberg. She began by going over contract money that paid out recently, including the $600 Higher Education Differential, as well as the annual 3% increase that was negotiated.
“We also had some really good increases to location pay, basically about 30% over the term of the contract,” said Greenberg. “The biggest chunk of that is going into effect this year.”
Downstate location pay rose from $3,400 to $4,000 this year. For members working in mid-Hudson locations, the increase was from $1,650 to $2,000. These payments are over the course of the year, and began the first paycheck closest to April 1.
There is also a major change to performance awards or longevity payments. In previous years, payments were made to those who have been working “at top of grade” for a certain number of years. This year, after vigorous negotiation by PEF, the payments switched to a new eligibility system that bases the payments on “years of continuous state service.”
“The continuous state service doesn’t have to be service in the PEF or PS&T unit. It could be with a different bargaining unit, or M/C, but it does have to be in the Executive Branch of NYS government,” said Greenberg. “Not if you worked for the legislature, not if you have work in the courts.”
Twelve (12) years of continuous state service earns a $1,500 longevity award, 17 years is $3,000 and 22 years is $4,500. These are lump sum payments that were already awarded in member checks on April 17 (administrative payroll) and April 23 (institution payroll).
After the Town Hall, PEF was notified that there were challenges in calculating years of qualifying service for the 2025 performance awards (longevities) for employees with more complicated work histories, which include the following groups:
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- Employees with multiple records when time in the records do not overlap
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- Employees with multiple payment eligible records
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- Hourly and FEE service
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- Legacy service prior to PayServ conversion
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- Certain reinstatements where the effective date of the reinstatement is after the effective date of the rehire
The Office of the State Comptroller will be conducting the necessary review and issuing additional and/or corrected payments. When we find out more specific details about the dates for these additional payments, we will provide an update.
Click here for a complete memo from PEF Contract Administration detailing the situation.
Finally, Greenberg touched on negotiations for a successor contract to the 2023-2026 collective bargaining agreement. The members of the new contract team were announced at the March executive board meeting and have already begun training.
“We want to be ready to begin bargaining early this round if we determine that is the best course of action,” said Greenberg. “Like we’ve been talking about throughout this call, we are in really challenging economic times, but we’re closely monitoring the situation to see if it makes sense to get to the table early and, if so, we’ll be ready.”
Greenberg said that even with all the uncertainty at the federal level, PEF was able to eliminate a lot of sunsets in the previous two contracts, so things like the Productivity Enhancement Program (PEP), performance awards, and tuition reimbursement will continue after the current contract expires on April 1, 2026, as will items that have always continued, such as health insurance benefits and performance advances.
In closing the call, President Spence took a moment to announce another contest surrounding the Toxic Workplace and Bullying campaign. The first contest was to name PEF’s new 20-foot inflatable bull. The winner, PEF retiree Barb Rock, won a $250 gift card and has successfully named the Bull: S.T.O.M.P., which stands for Stop Treating Our Members Poorly.
The next contest will send S.T.O.M.P. to a workplace where members are being treated poorly. The president asked members to tell PEF where the bull should be blown up first.
“We’re asking members to tell us in two paragraphs or less, where should we bring the bull?” he said. “Visit PEF on social media or send an email to Comms@pef.org to let us know.”
As a final farewell, President Spence thanked members at OCFS and DOCCS facilities for their hard work following the corrections’ officer strike.
“For those members who are working in correctional settings, and the OCFS settings and institutional settings where staffing is very short, I want to say that I appreciate the work you do,” said President Spence. “I don’t know if you hear it from your managers, I know that a lot of correctional facilities are operating at 50% or less in terms of staffing. Our civilians and parole officers have stepped up and picked up the slack. I want to let you know that we appreciate you.”