By JIM BARON

PROVIDENCE — Gov. Donald Carcieri issued an executive order Thursday that imposes on state workers in Council 94 the same health insurance co-pay and co-share provisions that they overwhelmingly rejected in a contract vote last week.

Council 94 officials immediately branded the action as “union  busting” and a “reckless and irresponsible course of action,” but Kernan King, the governor's executive counsel, characterized it as “among the mildest steps he could take in circumstances like this.”
Dennis Grilli, executive director of Council 94, conceded that  Carcieri “could have hit us harder and he didn't,” but nonetheless said the group of unions that constitute about a third of the state's workforce would go to court today seeking a temporary restraining order to stop the governor's plan from being implemented.
Grilli said in a press release, “Today Gov. Carcieri has made a difficult situation worse. By attempting to unilaterally impose increased health care premium co-shares upon our members' and their families, the governor has chosen a path that will increase the level of tension and acrimony between state employees and this administration.
“While we want to have a contract that is fair to Rhode Island taxpayers and some of the lowest paid state employees,” Grilli added, “Council 94 will not be bullied, coerced, or intimidated. Further,Council 94 is fully prepared to fight and respond to the Carcieri administration's actions swiftly and with all of the resources at our disposal."
Since the rejection of the proposed settlement last week, Council 94 members are effectively without a contract, the administration argues. Carcieri and company contend their position is bolstered by the state's letter to the umbrella group comprising two dozen state worker unions in June saying it wished to terminate the contract. 
“We are in uncharted territory,” Carcieri admitted at a press conference Thursday. “To my knowledge, this is the first time the state has terminated a contract with a union.”
Saying he wanted to demonstrate some of the options at his disposal with the union contract terminated, Carcieri said the administration has the right to stop deducting union dues from Council 94 members’ paychecks.  Dues are about $500 per employee annually, irrespective of their salary, or about $2 million per year total.
The administration may also require all union officials who are regular state employees to return to their regular jobs and not conduct union business on taxpayer time. 
“For the time being,” Carcieri asserted, “I am choosing not to take these actions but reserve the right to do so in the future.”
Not having union dues deducted from paychecks forces the union to collect its money from members, creating enforcement and administrative headaches.
Carcieri said he understands the terms of the agreement will inflict hardships on some employees, although he says it is not his intention to hurt workers.
“I understand that some people at the lower end of the salary scale are going to be adversely impacted and others won't,” the governor said. “That was all part of the discussions in coming up with the result.”Callers to talk radio and others advocated a get-tough stance, encouraging Carcieri to fire the balking union members the way President Ronald Reagan fired striking air traffic controllers in the early 1980s.The governor chose a more moderate path.
“I'm not standing here and saying that if you don't accept this (agreement) you will be fired; I'm not saying that,” Carcieri insisted. “I'm saying if we can't make this work, we are going to have to do layoffs and to do more shut-down days. We'll take it one step at a time.”
For now, he said the steps will include going into conciliation meetings with Council 94 and, if that fails, non-binding arbitration.
Carcieri said he was “genuinely surprised” when Council 94 members rejected the agreement. “I sincerely believe most of the members of Council 94 had no idea what they were voting on. I'm not sure they were explained in detail all of the elements of this package and how carefully and thoughtfully it had been worked out.”
Before the proposed agreement, some lower-paid state workers paid a percentage of their salary for health care, while higher-paid workers paid a percentage of the insurance premium. This was unfair to some workers, Carcieri explained, because two workers each making $40,000 would have to pay the same premium for health coverage, even though one benefited from a single plan and the other got the far more expensive family coverage.
Under the agreement and executive order, employees will now pay between 8 percent and 25 percent of the cost of their coverage, depending on salary range; the more someone makes, the higher insurance premium he or she pays. There are also increases in co-pays for primary care, urgent care and specialist office visits, as well as emergency room fees and prescription drug costs.
The agreement calls for a four-year pact with no salary increase in the first year, 2.5 percent in the second year and 3 percent in years three and four.
Carcieri said that while the goal of his 2009 budget was to extract about $60 million in concessions from employee unions, the agreement achieved only about $33.5 million. Enforcing the executive order will keep the savings at the $33.5 million level, he said.
Carcieri said all of the non-union employees working within the executive branch, and in the offices of the secretary of state, state treasurer and lieutenant governor will go forward contributing at the new levels of co-share, co-pays and plan design.  “Unfortunately,” he told reporters, “the attorney general has notified us that he will not.”
Michael Healey, spokesman for Attorney General Patrick Lynch, said Thursday, “We're not saying we won't ultimately do our share, because, for one, we recognize the rough shape the state of Rhode Island is in economically, and since August, 2005, we have been paying a co-share of between 8 and 15 percent of premiums depending on salary brackets. But this needs to be done in a much more structured and coherent way.
“We aren't going to be the only non-union shop not under the governor's control to accept that this is fair for our employees.”
At the end of the day, Healey said, “Council 94 and the governor could come up with something completely different from what the governor says is written in stone.”
Spokesmen for House Speaker William Murphy and Senate President Joseph Montalbano said the Joint Committee on Legislative Services, the administrative office of the General Assembly, would meet to determine whether its non-union employees would be subject to the provisions of the agreement.
Craig Berke, spokesman for the judiciary, said Carcieri's proposal is under review.