Morales Proposes Health Insurance Benefits… For Herself
Hmmmm...
Milwaukee Public Schools should provide full fringe benefits to domestic partners of all its employees, according to a proposal from a School Board member who would benefit substantially if such a change were made.
The board’s Finance Committee will take up the idea from Jennifer Morales at 6:30 Tuesday.
MPS Superintendent William Andrekopoulos and his staff have taken a strong stand against the proposal, saying the issue should be left to negotiations with unions.
Morales’ resolution calls for the board to express “its particular support of the equal provision of employment benefits regardless of an employee’s sexual orientation or family status.” If approved, it would make partners of top administrators and School Board members immediately eligible for benefits. For the vast majority of MPS employees, the change would have to await new labor contracts.
Morales and Tina Owen, the lead teacher at the Alliance School, an MPS charter school, went public in 2006 with their lesbian relationship. The two were married in Vancouver, British Columbia, in April, according to an Internet blog posting written by Morales. Wisconsin does not allow or recognize such marriages.
If fringe benefits were extended to domestic partners of MPS teachers, Morales could gain lifetime health insurance benefits and possibly other benefits that are now offered to Owen, but for which Morales does not qualify as a School Board member.
At a time when a lot of businesses are dropping benefits, this is ridiculous. My father’s employer forced him to switch to a single medical insurance plan and my mother to enroll in her employer’s medical insurance plan since she was eligible for that plan. If she wanted to stay on his plan, they would have paid a hefty penalty. I’m guessing it was to keep costs down. My father’s employer is not a small business either… it’s got a rather large footprint downtown.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 0934 hrs
I don’t think the burden of our health care disaster should be placed on the backs of gay people.
Can’t anyone think of a better way to cope than to identify people who should be excluded? Who’s next? Children? “I don’t see why they should be included on an employee’s health plan at a time when businesses are dropping benefits due to high cost.”
Let’s deal with the problem instead of notching our belts ever tighter. (Or notching someone else’s belt, as the case may be.)
Posted by scott on November 20, 2007 at 1024 hrs
I am not a fan of “Everything here is OK” Andrekopoulos, but he is right on making an insurance change a bargining point. Why not get a managment advantage point on the labor agreement, rather than just handing the teacher’s union a benefit?
Morales should not be a sponsor of this measure or vote on it as she has a conflict-she would directly benefit from the change. Doesn’t this board have an ethics policy?
Posted by T. Bone on November 20, 2007 at 1125 hrs
...and why the HELL are we paying “lifetime health insurance benefits” for any of the school employees? Try to find that in a private sector job!
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1130 hrs
Scott
I understand your desire for global change (I agree we need change but we both know that we don’t agree on the how of the change) but the question at hand is whether the district should be extending benefits to people who have never been covered in the past at a time when healthcare costs are rising. Adding benefits and then saying I sure hope the system gets fixed is not a responsible way for the district to spend other people’s money.
Your analogy to children falls apart because they are already covered. If the question was whether to add them today, in the face of the current costs, I would say no. This is a cost issue, not a discrimination, gender, etc issue.
Also, I am not sure if gay people are shouldering the burden of the our healthcare system. I think most gay people have jobs that may very well have their own insurance benefits. I have never seen a study that suggests that gays are less insured than the general population.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1143 hrs
Cal, we used to find lifetime insurance benefits in many corporate sector jobs here, at the largest companies such as the Journal Sentinel. They often came about in negotiations as tradeoffs for not getting higher pay, same as in the public sector, in the days when health care was not as costly as it is now.
So negotiating it off the table could cost more in other ways. It still might be the thing to do, but nothing comes without a cost.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1231 hrs
If the question was whether to add [children] today, in the face of the current costs, I would say no.
::speechless::
I am not sure if gay people are shouldering the burden of the our healthcare system.
Well, in a sense they are. They are a class of people who get shut out of coverage because we are so concerned about holding the line on cost for the rest of us. Whether they have been covered before is a noteworthy point, but ultimately I don’t think it changes that basic fact.
And if including people who should be included causes the system to go belly up sooner than it otherwise would have, good. Maybe we’ll be that much closer to finding a real solution.
No, “finding” isn’t even the right word, since it’s widely know what the solutions are. What we’ll “find” is the will to actually do what needs to be done.
Posted by scott on November 20, 2007 at 1251 hrs
They are only “shut out” if they don’t have coverage from another source. My point was I don’t think they are uninsured at any higher rate than heterosexuals. They may not get to have coverage from their partners but that is only one potential source of coverage. They could (and I think we would find that most do) get coverage from their own jobs.
The district has limited resources and the board needs to be prioritizing its funding not looking to incur more costs that are only tangentially related to (if at all) their mission.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1258 hrs
Since when is a School Board position full-time worthy of lifetime benefits. Thhppptt!
I’m not covered by my husband’s insurance. His company requires I carry my own through my employer as a carve-out because they are self-funded.
The conflict of interest here is also amazing - but what that is now standard fare from the new “protected class”.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1300 hrs
What jumped out at me in the original JS article, was that Morales IS covered by health insurance while a member of the school board. Isn’t that a PART TIME gig? Why are we insuring any of the MPS School Board members for a PART TIME position? What other bennies are they getting ?
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1523 hrs
Keep in mind, this isn’t just about homosexuals getting benefits, although that is generally the target audience. This would also be extended to people “regardless of their family status.”
In other words, somebody merely dating a school teacher would get the benefits. That alone should be reason enough to shoot this thing down. But unfortunately, everybody always turn this into a gay/straight argument.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1525 hrs
Here’s a question no one has even addressed.
How is the school district going to determine who gets the benefit. I have had a loyal friend for over 14 years. Would he be covered? He’s a Golden Retriever!!!!
How will the school district document relationships that go bad? What would the standards be? How long would you have to be in a relationship?
If I picked up someone for 3 weekends in row would they be covered? Is this going to be extended to heterosexuals who are not married but are living with someone?
And you wonder why Milwaukee County taxes went up 9%..
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1535 hrs
My point exactly (#11). The resolution says “regardless of family status.” So it could be anyone at anytime. What a great pick-up line:
“Hey baby, care to come back to my place for some hot-tubbing, mulled wine, and comprehensive medical and dental benefits?”
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1541 hrs
Pelican,
You are almost on point, it would be more like.
Hey baby, want to get paid for going to a Symposium, while we tell everyone its a teacher institute day, and then go back to my place for some hot-tubbing, mulled wine, and comprehensive medical and dental benefits?”
This is exactly what they are asking for.
Either way its just too funny.. (But True)
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1553 hrs
My other question would be, once the lifetime benefits are given, are they revoked should a relationship dissolve? Or does the employee get to have multiple people on the lifetime benefits?
Posted by hsgbdmama on November 20, 2007 at 1636 hrs
Man + Woman = Marriage is the answer
Enough of trying to scam the system
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1654 hrs
Exactly. With a marriage, there is a legally defined finality to its end. End of relationships? Who knows? Who among us has never made that 2:00 a.m. drunk call to an old girlfriend or boyfriend?
Like Seinfeld once said, “Breaking up is like knocking over a Coke machine. You can’t do it in one push. You gotta rock it back and forth a few times, and then it goes over.”
But if you want to keep a bunch of people on your taxpayer-funded health care plan, all you have to do is keep rocking that Coke machine back and forth…forever.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1658 hrs
>I don’t think the burden of our health care disaster should be placed on the backs of gay people.
Neither do I. Try to keep up.
>Can’t anyone think of a better way to cope than to identify people who should be excluded? Who’s next? Children? “I don’t see why they should be included on an employee’s health plan at a time when businesses are dropping benefits due to high cost.”
We’re not identifying anyone to be excluded. We’re using common sense and financial responsibility to limit inclusion. I’m all for cutting this particular benefit 100% before cutting the meat like band class, art class, sports programs.
>Let’s deal with the problem instead of notching our belts ever tighter.
Ok. Cut it. Problem solved.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 20, 2007 at 1745 hrs
If I were somehow able to talk the 2 of them into a 3way would I qualify for domestic partner benefits? (oh wait shes more manly looking than I am, never mind)
Perhaps MPS could actually do something smart with the money. Like oh I don’t know. Graduate more than 1 or 2 kids per year? (Your right that does seem like a high number, but I’ll give MPS the benefit of the doubt) And then perhaps the public MIGHT be a little more rerceptive to Ms. Morales trying to push her social agenda onto Milwaukee Taxpayers.
BTW who wants to bet me that when this gets shot down, (and it will) She is on TV granting interviews and Whining about how Milwaukeeians are just a bunch of bigots who don’t understand the struggles of a gay school board member who is just trying to make ends meet on the meager salaries of a Charter School Principal and her School board President lover?
Posted by Michael J. Cheaney on November 20, 2007 at 1751 hrs
Lifetime health coverage for school board members? Sounds like a good idea to me. Just kidding - I can imagine the lunatic fringe bursting into flames as they read this.
Posted by Charlie Hillman on November 20, 2007 at 1809 hrs
Mike, you’re CRAZY if you think that health/dental should be awarded to a non-married/non-dependent group of people at all. It shouldn’t be ‘depending on graduation rates.’
It shouldn’t be AT ALL.
Posted by dad29 on November 20, 2007 at 2034 hrs
DAD:
I don’t think they should be awarded to anyone. That was my larger point. And ESPECIALLY on yours and my dimes.
Set the bar to an unrealistic level (such as MPS actually graduating 3 kids per year) and keep telling them that if they do this then they might get their insurance.
Kind of a reverse psychology!
Posted by Michael J. Cheaney on November 20, 2007 at 2208 hrs
I agree that Morales has a conflict of interest and probably shouldn’t be the person pursuing this. But that said, there’s a whole lot of silliness and stupidity in these comments.
As for the limits of domestic partnership, most companies will require the employed partner to sign some kind of a statement that, while certainly not the same as a marriage license, entitles the partner to be on the policy. Should the relationship dissolve, the employed partner amends the statement.
Just as one example, this is the SOP at UW-Madison for domestic partners to have access to university facilities and whatnot. You can see the form here.
It’s silly for some of you to suggest that people in this situation, straight or gay, think so flippantly about matters like this. It’s rather disrespectful. It’s like you think everyone not in a marriage is completely irresponsible and just out to screw the system. None of you offer any evidence of widespread abuse in existing workplaces with domestic partnership benefits but yet some of you just assume that it would be rampant.
So for all of you joking about “when does the relationship end?” it’s cute but also stupid. It only proves that you don’t have much of an understanding about how domestic partnership benefits work. It’s like you think the countless state and local governments or Fortune 500 companies that provide them have no clue what they’re doing to protect themselves from potential abuse by employees.
If this was about cost, it’d be way cheaper for employers to dump female spouses and add domestic partners. Female spouses are, by far, the most expensive add-on to an institution’s health care plan because they have babies. Childbirth is easily the most expensive routine procedure covered that isn’t related to illness. Domestic partners, as a class of individuals, are way cheaper to insure than both female spouses AND children.
If we ever managed to unhinge insurance from private employers, I think you would struggle to find a single, non-faith based insurer that wouldn’t provide domestic partnership benefits. Generally speaking, domestic partners are easy money for insurers.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on November 21, 2007 at 0048 hrs
So, now we’re going to sign statements declaring when a relationship (however that’s defined) begins and ends?
“I attest that I don’t just like him/her, I really, really like him/her.”
What form do they fill out if they break up, backslide, then break up again, then bump into each two months later, backslide, and then break up again?
Get real, Potsie.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 21, 2007 at 1041 hrs
Works for hundreds, if not thousands, of other companies and units of government. Again, you’d think if there was a widespread problem doing it this way that there would’ve been a move to change it already by affected employers. Employers are generally rational actors, right? That’s what conservatives would have everyone believe most all of the time, right?
You’re trying to argue a scenario that you can’t even prove exists by being cute and ignoring the simple reality that you have no facts to back up your black-helicopteresque paranoia.
Put some solid proof on the table of companies/units of government being targets of widespread fraud by domestic partners. I’m sure we’d all be interested in reading it. I know I would. Otherwise, perhaps you don’t really have anything to contribute that would advance the discussion.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on November 21, 2007 at 1240 hrs
You think I’m cute? Are you flirting with me or are you just after my health and dental benefits?
Fresh! *slap*
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 21, 2007 at 1348 hrs
Okay, that made me laugh. I still think you’re wrong but that was pretty funny.
Posted by Recess Supervisor on November 21, 2007 at 1803 hrs
...and why the HELL are we paying “lifetime health insurance benefits” for any of the school employees? Try to find that in a private sector job!
School board members no longer get lifetime benefits. As for mps teachers, they can qualify for lifetime benefits if they have banked something like 110 sick days…which can be pretty difficult. It’s not like this is common for all mps retirees.
As for private vs. public sector, most people who enter civil service jobs take a lower pay for the better benefits.
Since when is a School Board position full-time worthy of lifetime benefits. Thhppptt!
Read the entire article. They took that away from the school board members.
Put some solid proof on the table of companies/units of government being targets of widespread fraud by domestic partners. I’m sure we’d all be interested in reading it. I know I would. Otherwise, perhaps you don’t really have anything to contribute that would advance the discussion.
Thank you for being one of the very few voices of reason on this message board.
If people want to change the way money is being distributed in mps, you are trimming the wrong area of the steak. MPS needs to cut positions at the central office level.
CLick on this excel spreadsheet and go to Milwaukee Sch District and look at all the “Milwaukee” in column H. These are mostly Central Office employees. There is a whole lot of money in that building.
Cut the bureaucracy, not the benefits.
Posted by .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on November 29, 2007 at 1726 hrs
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