June 2001

PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE - ROBERT A. KACZMAREK - The BCEA Annual Picnic at Magic Mountain was a great success. The weather was great and we had a large turnout with 389 tickets sold. I want to thank the Recreation Committee for all of their hard planning including the picnic menu, activities, and prize drawing. Thanks: Julianne Lopez, Committee Chair, Sharon Leech, Tami Antonello, Rita Smith, Sally Lucero, and Mike Castro.

Attention:
Your BCEA membership cards are enclosed in the hard copying of this newsletter. You can use your BCEA membership card to receive discounts at Thorburn Chiropractic, HWB Car Wash, Bytenet Computer/Printer repair, and Aida Sahkian, DDS. We will be offering more show your card and save discounts in the future.

HEALTH FAIR WILL BE IN AUGUST
CalPERS' open enrollment will be from August 15, 2001 through September 28, 2001 which is earlier than usual. The plans offered for 2002 will be: Blue Shield HMO, Health Net*(no new enrollees), Kaiser, Pacificare, PERS Care, PERS Choice, and Universal. The plans dropped for 2002 will be Aetna, CIGNA, Lifeguard, and Maxicare. Health plan changes include office visit copays from $5 to $10 for basic plans, and from $0 to $10 for medicare plans. Copay changes for basic and medicare will be lthe same. Prescription drugs purchased retain for a 30-day supply of will be $5/generic, $15/brand-name, and $30/Non-formulary. For a 90 to 100-day supply purchased through lmail order will be $10/generic, $25/brand-name, and $45/non-formulaty. Members will be have annual $1,000 out-of-pocket maximum for presecription drugs purchased through mail order.

The BCEA PEBT will have open enrollment for the 2002 year from August 15, 2001 through October 31, 2001. We will be mailing out prices and information at the end of June for the 2002 rates for PEBT.

WELLNESS NEW FISCAL YEAR JULY 1
We will be apprpoving wellness for the start of the 2001-2002 fiscal year on July 1, 2001. July 17, 2001 is the last day to submit your wellness receipts to the BCEA for July's meeting. Remember, wellness purchases must be made in the same fiscal year that the reimbursements are made.

AB 616 {3%@60} UPDATE
AB 616 Calderon will create a 3%@60 formula for miscellaneous employees. This would be a great benefit but it first must be passed in the legislature and signed by the Governor.

Representation of the BCEA and GCEA were invited to the Laborers Public Employee Lobbying Day on May 23 & 24. We had some training on Legislative lobbying and background on some of the bills affecting public employees. A representative of the PERB Board spoke to us about the new jurisdiction over public agencies. The following day we received directions to get around the Capitol building, and got work supporting AB 616. It was a great learning experience.

AB 616 passed the Assembly on June 4, 2001, and has moved on to the Senate. It has a hearing date set for June 25, 2001 in the Senate Public Employment and Retirement Committee. If you would like to support the bill you could send letters to the Committee members and your State Senator. The State Senator for the Burbank area is The Honorable Jack Scott. The members of the PE&R Committee are: