UNIONS TO GET NAMES OF STATE WORKERS

Labor unions will have greater access to state employees under a policy put into effect by Gov. Mel Carnahan's administration.

The policy, issued by H. Lee Capps, director of the Office of Administration's personnel division, became effective in March and will be used beginning in September.

Many of the provisions were contained in a draft policy circulated to state department directors in January by Mike Wolff, who was chief counsel to Carnahan at the time.

The new policy drew fire from Sen. Peter Kinder, R-Cape Girardeau.

"They can say whatever they want in the governor's office, but this thing is an unprecedented break with sound practices," said Kinder. "It sounds to me as if it is carte blanche for unions to unionize state government. It is opening the door to give union bosses access they have not had before and never should have to bother people at work and to get home addresses. It is bad, bad policy."

Last week about 60,000 employees on the state payroll system received an insert in their June paychecks that said names and other information about state employees would be made available to labor unions in September.

The insert stated that "the Office of Administration has agreed to make available a list of state employees' names, job classifications, departments and addresses to labor unions as of Sept. 1, 1994."

The insert gives employees the option of signing a form stating they do not want to have their home address released. In those instances, work addresses will be provided.

Capps explained Tuesday that there has been controversy for some time about information contained in personnel records and what is open and what is closed.

"State employee addresses are available a lot of places, including the state manual, but it had not been issued directly from payroll records," said Capps. "Unions had been wanting it to help them represent members of their bargaining unit, and the two things kind of came together."

Capps said unions have been given the work addresses of employees for years, but not home addresses. With this policy, home addresses can be given, but only if employees allow the state to do so.

Capps said supreme court decisions have found that once the employee list becomes public the state cannot pick and choose who has access to it. That means the list can now be sought by insurance companies or anyone wanting to solicit state employees.

"We all know how easy it is to get people's addresses, and state employee addresses are available in a number of ways," Capps said. "The Office of Administration was interested in changing that policy. The union was a big part of that change, but not the only part."

He said the new policy is a compromise because unions and others groups have been saying for some time that the employee information is public and should be available.

"In a sense this option is a compromise between unions and groups like insurance companies, who believe the information is public and the position of some employees who prefer that it not be public," said Capps.

Capps said providing employee addresses to unions is one of five policy changes made by the administration with regard to management relations with unions.

The other changes, Capps explained, are:

-- Reducing the restriction on access to employees on the work site, although unions cannot solicit employees on work time. Each department has reached its own agreements, some more restrictive than others, with unions concerning access to work sites.

-- If an agency has a formal orientation for new employees, unions may have 15 minutes to make new employees aware of what the union has to offer.

-- State employees who are union officials can have time off from state business, without pay, to attend union meetings or functions related to union business.

-- Union involvement in representing employees in grievance and disciplinary proceedings will be increased. This means unions could provide expertise and support for employees involved in such proceedings.

Presently there are 11 bargaining units in state government representing various groups of employees, Capps said. A typical bargaining unit is the Department of Corrections, where security employees of all facilities across the state are represented by one unit while probation and parole employees are represented by another.

Once the State Board of Mediation recognizes a union as representing public employees, management is required to meet and confer with union representatives. But since Missouri does not have collective bargaining for its employees, Capps said management must meet to confer and discuss, but is not bound to reach an agreement with the union.

Capps acknowledged the new policy could increase union representation of state employees, but disagreed with claims that it is a step toward legalizing collective bargaining.

"It is not a step toward collective bargaining," said Capps. "It could even be argued that it is a step away because these are things the union would seek in a collective bargaining law that they now have by policy.

"This provides unions with greater access to employees and greater representation of employees that are members."

Kinder said the policy is retaliation by the Carnahan administration to the Senate's failure to approve collective bargaining for state employees in the last session. Collective bargaining bills have failed over the years, with past governors Christopher Bond and John Ashcroft promising vetoes.

Carnahan has said he would sign a bill if passed by the legislature.

Kinder called the policy "a wide open invitation" to collective bargaining. "This is a recipe for more union organizing and more union strife in state government," he said. "It will lead to work stoppages -- whether legal or illegal -- and more trouble and higher costs. I don't think the people want this."

The senator said providing home addresses to unions raises privacy issues. "These issues are very troubling to me," said Kinder. "To just turn over lists of state workers to union organizers is a terrible precedent to set."

Rep. Larry Thomason, D-Kennett, who sponsored legislation this year to limit access to some information about employees and citizens, said Missouri has "the most liberal law concerning public information than any state in the nation."

Thomason said he does not see the release of names and addresses as any threat, and employees can ask that home addresses not be given.

Under state law, Thomason said any business wanting to sell something can get specialized information from the Department of Revenue about individuals. "This is far less threatening," said Thomason.

"I don't see the sky falling or any big problem here. There is a certain class of people out here who have the `Chicken Little' syndrome; no matter how little something is, they try to read in the worst possible scenario."

Capps said he has heard criticism both ways of the administration's new policy toward unions. "Actually, the comments were less than I expected. I think there was a general understanding because of past discussion," said Capps.

"I think it was accepted pretty well. There are those who don't like it on both sides. Some say it is way too much and others say it's not near enough. It all depends on who you ask, but it is a compromise."