SUCCESS! Legislature passes wage increase for direct care employees

We have some great news to share: As the result of our efforts, state lawmakers passed a wage increase of 80 cents per hour for direct care employees!

Throughout the last several months, direct care employees represented by AFSCME Council 31 stood up together to demand the basic fairness we’re entitled to. Gov. Pritzker's proposed budget originally included an increase of only 50 cents, but we were determined to do better.

We called our lawmakers. We gathered more than 800 signatures on our petition. And in April, dozens of direct care employees from every corner of state converged on Springfield to tell our stories to lawmakers and advocate for a fair wage increase.

In the final weeks before the legislative session adjourned, we mounted a campaign to email our lawmakers demanding strong pass-through language to make sure any wage increase got where it belonged: in our pockets.

This work paid off: Our union was able to secure pass-through language requiring our employers to distribute all of the money directly to us.

75% of the increase—60 cents—must go directly to workers’ base wages, while our employers have more flexibility on how to use the remaining 25%—20 cents—so long as it also goes towards base wages for frontline workers.

This year's increase is the the tenth straight AFSCME has won! In 2017, the wage rate was just $10.71. With this year’s increase, we’ve nearly doubled that.

Additionally this session, the governor proposed drastic cuts to the rate at which CILAs are reimbursed. AFSCME's lobbying team was able to fend off the worst of these cuts, but the final budget still includes some reductions. We will continue to push for full funding for CILAs going forward.

This was a very tough budget year. The billionaire-backed assault on state funding coming from Washington, D.C. has led many lawmakers to be concerned about approving any new spending. The fact that we were able to win this increase under such difficult financial conditions is a testament to the hard work of every direct care employee in our union—and we should all give ourselves a pat on the back.

We’ve made great progress in recent years, but we’re not stopping here. We know that there is still more work to be done and even more progress to be made. And we'll be back to demand the fair wages we’re owed next year, too.