I cannot tell you anything other than what I have already said because that --
The Mayor has never forbidden me to speak fully and honestly, and if a 37 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 mayor forbade me to speak honestly and fully, I would not be able to work for that individual.
-- or taking steps to answer them? Because what you are telling us, as I understand it, is that until you complete your full study and get all of the documentation, which may take us into the year 2200, that until then, you can't speak about anything. And that makes absolutely no sense to me. I learned in my first job that the first thing you did was when the employer asked you for something, your immediate supervisor, you got that and you didn't wait until you could come in and answer every question in the universe, but if he asked for specific information, you went out quickly and got that. We've been asking about the savings plan that was allegedly presented during the union negotiations, and I can't understand -- it's now several weeks since we first raised that with you. Why haven't you made real efforts to see whether you 38 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 can give us a complete answer, that maybe there was no full-fledged plan, but there was a document which talked about savings. You didn't have all of the information then, you can't remember it all now, but you went out and tried to locate it physically so that you'd be in a position to present it to us. I can't understand why you're not doing that, why you keep answering -- you explained to us previously that you've been assigned this great job of producing documentation to all of the questions we have. We'd like answers to the questions we've now asked. We're not asking for the millennium and for you to present all of the documentation because that may take us a long time. Why don't you deal with what we asked you? Councilman Nutter's questions were very specific and direct.
Councilman Cohen, I have nothing to add. I have nothing to add other than what I have already said. You can ask me the question, you can share your frustration, you can share your anger. I have nothing to add to that today. 39 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476
Absolutely not, sir. Absolutely, I am not defying -- I respect the work of this committee, I respect the role that you have, I respect your need for due diligence, and I respect you personally. I am not defying this committee. I am attempting to gather all of the information and I have --
And you're not going to be able to discuss any of the information until you gather it all?
I cannot discuss anything I do not have in my possession. I am prepared to try and discuss the reams of material that we sent over to your office last week and this week. And I have sent much that over without having taken the opportunity to read it before it came, because when I received it, I had it duplicated and sent over to you because I am attempting to be responsive.
One of your responses was that you have a job. Could you please tell me 40 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 if it would be helpful if this committee would write a letter to the Mayor getting you some help? It sounds like you need some help to get the information that we need. Are you just not able physically to gather the information? And I would ask the Chairman that if that is the case, that if you need some assistance since this, according to you, is a very serious issue, if your staff won't permit -- your staffing level won't permit you to respond as quickly as this committee needs the information, do you need some help?
Then what's the problem? If you say you have other things to do, then --
Councilman Rizzo, I have asked -- as I said, I have just recently gotten into the entire issue of the City-administered health plan. I have had no documentation of my own. I have requested documentation from sources in the government such as the Personnel Department and the Law Department to provide me whatever documents they have. And as I have been able to receive those 41 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 documents, you have also received copies of them when you first became involved in this process as a seasoned executive.
When you realized that you didn't have the information that you needed to understand this new role that you were undertaking, did you ask anybody to -- did you need this committee to ask you for information that you -- it sounds to me that you need to do your job. You indicated that you wouldn't work for someone that asked you to do something that was wrong or not truthful.
But it sounds like you're working for someone that's keeps you in the dark.
No one is keeping me in the dark, I do not work for anyone who keeps me in the dark.
We have said that the documentation on the City-administered health plan has been poor. That documentation has not been kept 42 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 by the people to whom I am directly accountable. It has been kept by others in the government. I am not here to criticize them either. But the documentation, the record-keeping has been exceptionally poor. It may be among the poorest I have ever experienced.
I don't know whether it exists. Do I believe that some of it exists? Probably. But without going personally through every file cabinet in every office that may have ever touched the City-administered health plan, I can't tell you what the universe of documentation is. And that is as -- if you can accept this, it is as frustrating to me at this point as it is to you. And perhaps more so to me because I have to come here and be the recipient of your frustration and your dismay at not being able to produce the documents.
Did you -- what 43 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 happened when you -- with respect to the list of retirees with their names and addresses that we asked you to produce?
I have spoken with the Executive Director of the Board of Retirement and Pensions, who has advised me that that information is not public information, but that the Board would be happy to try and help Council in any way it could if it understood what it wanted with that list, and perhaps it could be the conduit -- if Council wanted to get information to retirees, it could be the conduit for doing that, but that that information is not public information. Those retirees are not public employees and their addresses are not public information.
How could that not be public information? 44 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476
It is my understanding that that is not public information and that retirees believe that where they reside is private.
You mean that the Pension Board is saying to City Council that it has the right to censor the material made available to City Council?
I have been advised by the Executive Director of the Pension Board that that information is not public information.
And what has that got to do at all with the question of furnishing that information to City Council committees?
I was advised by the Executive Director of the Pension Board that the list of retirees with addresses is not available, but that if the City Council -- if this committee wishes to make a request to the Pension Board, the Pension Board will consider it.
Well, that's really a very interesting statement you're making. You're saying the Pension Board says it is free to decide whether or not it wants to comply with a request 45 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 from City Council, but it will honor us by saying if we make the request directly to them, they will consider it?
Councilman, I am not an attorney, I cannot validate the Pension Board's policy of privacy. And you might want, number one, to make a request to the Pension Board; and number two, to talk with the City Solicitor, who is also available to City Council, because I believe that the determinations of what is public information and what is available and to whom it is available is determined by the City's Law Department.
You know, I just get a sense, Miss Berkowitz, that despite the statements you've made to the contrary attempting to indicate that you are a self-assured, independent person who demands integrity from your employers so that you can do your work properly and honestly and fully, I just have a feeling that all that's happening that walls are being built up to prevent us from getting the material we need to perform our work. I'm getting a very uncomfortable feeling about that, Miss Berkowitz. 46 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 And it may be that we're going to have to deal on the basis of legal subpoenas that are enforceable in courts because I just have a sense that you are determined not to make available to us any information. You keep telling us you haven't made your study. We're not now on the first day of questioning, we're not now on the first day of your assignment. It seems to me that everything we've asked for could have been obtained if there were really an effort to get it on your part. I think that somehow or another, you are not making a good-faith effort to provide us with the material. I want you to know that I'm getting very concerned about every obstacle being placed in our way to get information that We need to do our work. So you're telling us that you accepted -- did you notify me that you were rejected by the Pension Board?
I had a discussion with Mr. Herkness yesterday, and no, I did not. And I apologize for that.
You know there was another contention that was made by the City to the effect that the employment of a broker had produced 47 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 millions of dollars in savings to the City. Have you been able to determine any documentation which either supports or refutes or does either in part of that contention?
Other than what the Rendell administration published in its five-year financial plans beginning in 1993, no, I have not had the opportunity to do that.
And what facts did the Rendell administration state in that five-year plan?
Councilman, if you will recall, I cannot give you the numbers, but if you will recall, one of the first initiatives in the Rendell administration was to reduce the health and welfare benefit costs to the City.
Well, they did that by increasing co-pays and making the employees pay a greater percentage of costs. They did it by introducing all kinds of deductibles.
Now, if that is the definition of efficiency, that would be very interesting. 48 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476
That was laid out for Council over the course of a number of years. I think the members of Council were -- including members of this committee, were fully aware of all of that information at that time, as were the unions. They were all public documents.
Well, what are you referring to as -- what was the public documents?
I don't know what you moan that they were all laid out. You mean the thinking of City was laid out or the policy when the City was --
The savings to the general fund of the health and welfare benefit reforms.
I have no 20 understanding of what that means in any sense at all. I've never known the City to openly discuss with anybody anything other than the terms of the current health plan, whatever year they were talking about.
I never heard them explain in advance that they had various proposals that they were going to make and, therefore, they were interested in the reactions.
Councilman Cohen, we were talking about savings. I believe that the issue that I was asked to address was savings, and what I have said to you is, I have not gone back and calculated them, but those savings were discussed and reflected both in the City's five-year financial plans beginning in 1993 as well as in the operating budgets passed by this Council.
Well, this committee has the right to ask an Administration representative to answer a question and not to refer the committee to other documentation --
So I'm asking you for the answers to the questions on savings.
Councilman Cohen, there 50 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 were a number of requests for information made by Council in a letter dated June 4th to Joyce Wilkerson. I have attempted to put together responses to each of those information requests. We have made it very clear that we are not through in doing that. We said that last week. We -- I don't know what else -- I don't know at this point what I can tell you that I have not already told you. You've raised a number of issues --
Well, tell us one thing: Are you going to try to get information or are you going to continue to avoid trying to get information?
Well, then why haven't you been in touch with Mr. Foley to find out whether he has this document or not?
What is required to have an opportunity to do that? You mean you don't have a telephone or you don't know his phone 51 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 number? What's so difficult about putting in a call to somebody who receives payments from the City of Philadelphia to say you are requesting certain information from him? Or do you lack authority to deal with him; do you have to go to someone else?
Councilman Cohen, this committee asked for a great deal of information. And as I have had the opportunity to obtain that information, Council has received it.
What defines your ability to obtain information? What do you mean, as you have the opportunity? I would think that's your number-one job.
Councilman Cohen, I don't know what it is you want to hear from me. If you-- I don't know what I --
What we're asking you -- I can't understand why you haven't called Mark Foley and asked for information.
I have a vague 52 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 recollection that at one time you had a document and --
I have not finished gathering the information. And that is all I can say on the subject.
That means I have not finished gathering all of the information.
We're not asking you to wait until you gather all of the information. We're asking you sometimes for pieces of information, and one is documentation of some kind or a clear unequivocal statement that there is no 16 documentation. (Ms. Simpson approaches witness, offering cell phone.)
Here, call him now, right now. Why can't she call him right now.
Miss Simpson, please. (Ms. Simpson leaves cell phone on witness table.)
Councilman Cohen, I'm going to say this with all due respect to the committee. I have sat here last week and this week and been verbally assaulted at this table. If that continues, I will respectfully stand away from the witness stand until it is over.
I would like that individual to come and get her telephone, and I would like -- I would respectfully request that we proceed with some decorum and civility.
I'm going to recess 54 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 this hearing at this point until this -- well, I will hold the recess till later, but I will recess that portion involving the witness. I'm going to ask that this Tuesday, at noon, in this chambers, that you appear and give us a specific response with respect to what you have been able to find out about any studies, documentation, any plans, or anything relating to studies of savings that would be made by unification and consolidation of plans, whether there was -- and to produce whatever basis at all of the existence of any kind of a sketch of a framework of a plan or a thought or an idea, and to pursue every necessary means to contact people whom you believe might have information if you don't have it or if there's no 17 other documentation that you can locate in the files. I just have a feeling that this committee is not being dealt with properly by the witness. And, therefore, maybe to clarify issues in my own mind, I would like to give you the opportunity to produce whatever you can, showing that you've made a genuine effort to obtain information for the committee, anything related to 55 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 savings, anything showing how it was arrived at -- the conclusion was arrived at that consolidation would be in the interest, whatever support exists anywhere. And I'm asking you to do it 'cause you're presented by the Administration, and that doesn't mean that you personally have to have the information, but I believe if the Administration presents you as its premier witness, it is saying that you have the authority to do whatever is necessary to get that information. So, Miss Berkowitz, I'm going to ask that you -- I'm going to tell you you're free to leave the witness stand but to be here this coming Tuesday at the noon hour here in the main chambers. We're going to be recessing after one or two other witnesses testify.
But there's no sense just engaging in a fencing match in which it's clear to me at this point -- at least it seems clear to me -- that you are doing everything in an effort to see that we don't get information that we are entitled to have. 56 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476
Yes. There will be a public hearing here at noon this coming Tuesday, June the 18th, 19th? June the 19th. Is that Tuesday? Could somebody check the calendar?
If there is a public hearing on Tuesday, the 19th, I will be here.
Thank you. Now, who was indicating they wished to testify? (Witnesses come forward.)
And at that time, 57 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 Miss Berkowitz, we're going to be asking you also on the question we have not asked you about today and that is your response to Mr. Lamb's --
As I indicated to you on Tuesday, Mr. -- it was -- this was the first I was made aware of the issue. I do not have benefit of any of the information that Mr. Lamb has given the committee today, but --
Would the Sergeant-at-Arms take it from Mr. Lamb and then 58 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 present it to Miss Berkowitz.
No, please give the information to the Sergeant-at-Arms, and will the Sergeant-at-Arms present it to Miss Berkowitz.
Thank you. -- that if, in fact, Mr. Lamb was correct and a suit had been filed against the City concerning this issue, that I would not be able to discuss it because it is in litigation. It is my understanding that this issue is in litigation, although I firmly believe that the City would like to settle it amicably, but I am not permitted to discuss something under litigation.
All right, we'll accept that answer for the time being. And you do confirm the fact that there is the litigation --
And that it basically contains -- it deals with the kind of allegations 59 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 that Mr. Lamb stated it does.
It deals with the issue -- I would not use the term "allegation," but it deals with the issue that Mr. Lamb raised on Tuesday and discussed here again today.
All right. I know the City has a policy -- the Law Department has a policy generally of not wishing to discuss publicly matters under litigation. We'll take that up if we think it appropriate with the Law Department.
Bob McAlister, the Benefits Administrator for AFSCME District Council 47.
I'm sorry, I'm unable to hear you. Please speak right into the microphone.
I'm Bob McAlister, the 60 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 Benefits Administrator for AFSME District Council 47. Is it on?
I think it's important here that I respond to some of the City's testimony presented here today. Miss Berkowitz testified that the City of Philadelphia did not know what our medical rates were. Since 1992, the City of Philadelphia has had a trustee on our board. That trustee knows all of the rates that we pay. They know the rate that we pay for our Personal Choice product, our Keystone product, our dental, our prescription and vision. So the City of Philadelphia has known, since they have a trustee sitting on our board, everything that we pay for our medical benefits. In addition to that, each and every year, a certified audit is given to the City representative on that board that shows how all of our health care dollars have been spent. So for the City Administration to sit here today at this meeting and say that they did not know what our medical rates were is completely false. 61 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476
One is -- I just have a very -- just a couple of brief comments to make and then a question for you and the committee. The -- I've been listening -- I've been here every day to listen to the testimony that has been given by the City representatives, whether it be Joyce Wilkerson or Linda Berkowitz. And to me -- and this is my opinion and I think the opinion of my union, that it is just been a big game, a stall game. We have -- we were told well before the negotiation process actually began that the City's main demand, main demand that they made to the media, whether it was the print media, the electronic media, was to have a unified health care system in the City of Philadelphia, that they had a study that would show that it would save money, that they wanted the FOP, the firefighters 33 and 47 62 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 health plans dissolved and brought into one. In fact, in the negotiations, this was stated time and time again, particularly in the early negotiations, that they would not even discuss issues such as health and safety or wages or many other issues until the issue of a City-administered plan was dealt with. And we began to get into that and we acceded to that demand. That was there position. We asked them, so help me God, over and over and over again for facts and figures about their plan. Give us information, how would it work, where did you get these savings, and on and on and on, every single day. They refused, absolutely refused, to provide us -- and I'll say this in front of her or in front of Joyce Wilkerson or the Mayor or anyone else. They refused to give us that information, they refused to give it to the City Controller, they refused to give it to the committee. What's going on here? But yet they put it out to the people of Philadelphia as propaganda that they had this study, that they had all these savings in order to really beat our brains in in terms of health care. And yet 63 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 when they've been asked over and over and over again, for not just a period of a couple days or a couple of week, but over a year, they don't have the information. My question is really simple now, and that is: Does this committee have the power, when it calls witnesses, whether they're union witnesses, whether they're City Administration witnesses or anyone else, to swear people under oath? And if they do, I would strongly feel, whether it's me, whether it's Linda Berkowitz, or whether it's Wilkerson or the Mayor, that people be sworn and be reminded of penalties of perjury. Because if they do that, this is what should happen here. I'm sick and tired of hearing the absolute lies and distortions. Didn't know what was going on. She was a part of the negotiating team, she sat there for these negotiations. This is just so absurd. It's like saying the three of you really aren't there, you're some metaphysical aberration. This is just nonsense. People should be sworn and reminded that if you lie or fail to give the information of perjury. It's just ridiculous. 64 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 This issue isn't going to go away. In six months or less, the negotiations with police and fire are going to start again. And we haven't gotten one ounce of cooperation. And yet, we give them everything. And they're a trustee, sits on our board, has the right to it, and gets it. And yet, we hear over and over again, they don't have this, they don't have that, they're telling the Controller they don't have this or they don't have that. When are people saying enough's enough here? (Applause.)
The committee will take your request under advisement. We generally, over the years, have never taken, except in one instance, one committee for a short time put all witnesses under oath. We hoped that we could achieve truthful responses without that formality, but we will consider your motion. This might be an appropriate circumstance where we have to reconsider the procedure and adopt very formal procedures which could hold accountable witnesses for the true of 65 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 their statements.
Chairman Cohen, let me just again repeat that I'm not asking for something -- a different standard for the City Administration than I would ask for the union. If they have to be sworn, we'll be sworn. Let's have equal justice for all here. I think it's about time for that.
All right, thank you. Is this any other witness who wishes to be heard today? Miss Simpson. (Witness comes forward.)
Louise Simpson, chief cook and bottle washer and troublemaker. I have a question. I don't know whether it's appropriate, but I want to place it before you as president of this committee. The Freedom of Information Act relates to those areas that impact with federal monies. The City of Philadelphia gets federal monies for all kinds of things, and I do not know whether or not it is applicable under the Freedom of Information Act to get the information 66 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 that we want.
This committee is in no position whatever to make any sort of reply.
I'm just raising the issue to put before the committee to see whether or not this is in fact one way of doing it. Because the Board of Pensions has also said that the information is confidential, they cannot put it out to individuals. However, I don't know if that is applicable to members of City Council and especially this committee. I don't see that it has any relevance.
Is there another gentleman who wishes to be heard? If not, the committee will stand in recess until Tuesday, June 19th, at noon, in the chambers, in the room we're meeting in now. Thank you. 67 6/14/01 LAW & GOV'T - BILL 000476 (Adjourned 2:17 p.m.) - - - 68 C E R T I F I C A T E I HEREBY CERTIFY that the foregoing proceedings of the Council of the City of Philadelphia of Thursday, June 14, 2001, were reported fully and accurately by me, and that this is a correct transcript of same. RE: COUNCIL COMMITTEE ON LAW AND GOVERNMENT RES. NO. 000476 __________________________________, JOSEPHINE CARDILLO, Registered Professional Reporter