Impasse declared on home-care pact

OLYMPIA — House leaders yesterday gave up trying to reach agreement with the Senate on a proposed contract giving home health-care workers a pay raise, and asked a state agency to negotiate a new contract before lawmakers go home for the year.

It's not clear how the action will affect state budget negotiations, or even if a new round of contract negotiations will be allowed.

The union representing the 26,000 home health-care workers is pushing for new contract negotiations to ensure its members get some sort of raise out of this session.

Lawmakers have been struggling in a special session that started May 12 to close the state's projected $2.65 billion budget shortfall. The state's first contract with newly unionized home-health-care workers, who now earn $7.68 an hour, has been a major sticking point.

Under the proposed contract, home-care workers would get raises of $2.07 per hour over the next two years and many would qualify for health insurance. The deal was expected to cost the state $98 million.

Through passage of Initiative 775, voters in 2001 approved a collective-bargaining process with home-care workers. This is the first contract proposed between the state Home Care Quality Authority and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). The Legislature can vote only yes or no on the contract. If rejected, the contract goes back to the bargaining table.

House leaders yesterday sent a letter to the SEIU and other affected parties, saying an impasse had been reached in budget negotiations and a new contract was needed. The letter was signed by House Speaker Frank Chopp and House Appropriations Chairwoman Helen Sommers, among others.

Adam Glickman, a spokesman for SEIU, said the union was already gearing up for a new round of bargaining and thinks a deal can be reached quickly — in time to be part of a budget agreement this session.

"They're asking us to go back to the negotiating table while they're doing the budget. We should be done within days," Glickman said.

But the Senate's top budget writer, Sen. Dino Rossi, R-Sammamish, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, said it was "legally premature" to declare the contract dead. Senate Republicans have objected to the raises throughout the session.

Rossi said the contract can't be declared dead until a final budget is passed and signed by the governor.

In a letter to Gov. Gary Locke, the Home Care Quality Authority and the SEIU, Rossi said funding for raises remains a part of budget negotiations. The letter was signed by Rossi, fellow Senate Republican negotiator Sen. Joe Zarelli, House Republican negotiator Rep. Barry Sehlin and Senate Democratic negotiator Sen. Darlene Fairley.

The letter says Initiative 775 requires an action by the Legislature to reject a contract and that a letter from House leaders is not sufficient.

"Impasse means nothing," Rossi said in an interview. "How many times have you seen an impasse and then something happens."

The SEIU, in a prepared statement, said it thinks there is sufficient reason to renegotiate a contract.

"We have determined that the failure of several weeks of bargaining to produce a final agreement ... the continued refusal of the Senate Republicans to support the contract, and the letter we received from House Democrats declaring the budget negotiations to be at an impasse is sufficient cause to declare the contract rejected and return to the bargaining table."

Sommers, D-Seattle, said the impasse over the SEIU contract should not derail budget talks.

Sommers said the House still supports the union and its proposed contract.

"We look at it differently than Dino Rossi does," Sommers said. "He doesn't want to put any money into it and we feel very strongly we need to. So there is a big difference in philosophy."

Andrew Garber: 360-943-9882 or agarber@seattletimes.com

Seattle Times reporter Ralph Thomas contributed to this report.