Cook County Sheriff’s Office Negotiations Back on Track

We got the negotiations back on track this week. Both sides withdrew their proposals on flextime and agreed to utilize the Labor-Management Committee to define appropriate uses.

We also agreed to lateral transfers, job bidding, and layoff/recall language that expand the rights of members without being overly burdensome.

We have one open issue on these seniority-related issues: Whether laid-off Sheriff’s Office employees can fill vacancies in other County Offices represented by SEIU and whether other SEIU represented County employees will be given preferential consideration to fill vacancies before offered to outside applicants.

We are still negotiating for contract language which protects civilian workers from sexual harassment or sexual abuse at work. We want the right to report incidents in CCOMS, better training, and some sort of panic buttons in work areas.

But even as we try to resolve these remaining issues, we will begin moving toward economic negotiations:

• Increase the steps so that senior employees will be rewarded for long-term service
• Across the Board raises every year for every worker
• Move CRW I’s to CRW II job and pay grade
• Improve educational benefits including tuition reimbursement
• Maintain affordable healthcare and create a retiree health benefit option

Our next scheduled negotiations are June 3rd, but there will likely be County-wide economic negotiations scheduled sooner.