Dave Regan’s Ballot Initiatives Are Routed despite Millions in SEIU-UHW Funding

On Tuesday, SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan suffered a severe drubbing at the polling place despite having spent upwards of $30 million on ballot initiatives this year.

Regan’s biggest measure -- California’s Proposition 8 targeting dialysis companies -- was defeated by a tally of 61.5% (“No”) to 38.5% (“Yes”), according to the California Secretary of State.

Ouch.

Regan dumped more than $20 million of SEIU-UHW’s budget into that campaign.

Why did Regan lose so badly?

He was vastly outspent by his opponents. Plus, Regan ran a sloppy and poorly designed campaign, say analysts.

The proposition also was poorly written and difficult for voters to understand, said Erin Trish, associate director of health policy at the USC Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics.

(Ana B. Ibarra and Anna Gorman, “Measure To Cap Dialysis Profits Pummeled,” California Healthline, November 8, 2018.)

Gerald Kominski, a senior fellow at the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research, said Regan’s campaign, unlike his opponents’ effort, failed to deliver a clear message to voters about why they should support it.

In case losing wasn’t bad enough, Regan also helped deliver a giant payday to his multi-billion dollar opponents. The day after the election, the stock price of both DaVita and Fresenius soared. In fact, DaVita’s share price jumped by 9.9%, according to CNBC.

Way to go, Dave!

Regan’s loss on Proposition 8 wasn’t his only defeat.

In Northern California, voters delivered an even bigger thumping. 

Two city-wide ballot initiatives lost by a landslide. In Palo Alto, Regan’s Measure F lost by a margin of 77% (“No”) to 23% (“Yes”). Meanwhile, in Livermore, Measure U lost by a margin of 82% (“No”) to 17% (“Yes”).

Both initiatives targeted Stanford Health Care in an effort to pressure the healthcare system into giving Regan a special unionization deal. If the measures had been approved, they would have capped healthcare providers’ revenues.

SEIU-UHW's Dave Regan

Duane Dauner – the former CEO of the California Hospital Association and Regan’s one-time paramour --   led the campaigns to defeat the two initiatives. Meanwhile, Regan’s former pals at Kaiser Permanente contributed money to defeat Regan’s initiatives.

Will Regan finally hang up the towel on ballot initiatives?

This year, he doubled down on his so-called “innovative” strategy of using ballot initiatives to “rebuild” the US labor movement. And he circulated more initiatives than during the past six years combined. At the end of the day, however, not a single measure was successful.

As a result, Dave successfully flushed upwards of $30 million of SEIU-UHW members’ dues money down the toilet.

Has Regan finally learned his lesson?

It doesn’t look like it. Late on election day, Regan issued a press release announcing his plans to refile the same dialysis ballot initiative in 2020. WTF.

Will SEIU-UHW’s members allow Dave to flush millions more dollars down the toilet?

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan Continues His Losing Streak against California Hospital Association

Dave Regan has apparently lost yet another round of his legal battle against the California Hospital Association (CHA), according to court records.

On June 14, 2017, Regan’s lawyers submitted a formal notice to the Sacramento County (Calif.) Superior Court announcing that Regan is dropping his personal lawsuit against the CHA. A copy of the notice is posted below.

Why is he dropping his lawsuit?

Regan was likely forced to do so by an outside arbitrator, who was ordered by a Superior Court judge to examine whether Regan’s personal lawsuit violates a provision of Regan’s secret deal with the Hospital Association. As part of the deal, Regan signed a far-reaching “gag clause” and arbitration provision that blocks him and SEIU-UHW members from criticizing hospitals execs, supporting legislation contrary to execs’ interests, suing hospital corporations, or even mentioning hospital executives’ gold-plated salaries in public.

Here’s what happened:

In late 2015, Regan’s “partnership” deal with the CHA collapsed in flames.

Under the 2014 partnership deal, Regan agreed to use SEIU’s political power to deliver $6 billion a year in new Medicaid revenues to California’s hospital corporations. In exchange for the cash, hospital CEOs would push 60,000 of their employees into Regan’s union. Regan sweetened the deal for the bosses by agreeing to ban workers from striking and forcing SEIU-UHW members into pre-negotiated labor contracts with stripped down wages and benefits.

Soon after the collapse of his secret deal, Ragin’ Dave Regan angrily sued Duane Dauner and three other top CHA officials. Regan also re-filed a statewide ballot initiative to target CHA’s members.  

The CHA quickly filed a counter-suit against Regan, arguing that his actions were prohibited by the “gag clause” that Regan himself had signed on behalf of SEIU-UHW.

In June of 2016, a judge agreed with the CHA and ordered SEIU-UHW to withdraw the ballot initiative after Regan had spent millions of dollars of SEIU-UHW members’ dues money to collect signatures to qualify the initiative for the ballot.

 

SEIU-UHW's Dave Kieffer

Next, the CHA asked the court to force Regan to drop his lawsuit against Dauner and three other top CHA officials. The CHA argued that the suit also violated Regan’s gag clause. In January 2017, a judge ordered the issue to be resolved by an outside arbitrator.

Last week, Regan’s lawyers informed the court that Regan is dropping his lawsuit against Dauner and three other CHA officials, including Kaiser Permanente’s Greg Adams. Regan likely dropped the suit as a result the arbitrator’s decision, which is not available to the public.

This latest developments represent yet another stinging defeat for Regan and SEIU-UHW. 

When Regan announced his secret deal with the CHA in 2014, Regan borrowed a page from Donald Trump and famously called it an "audacious new proposal to save the labor movement" …even though it violated every value held dear by the labor movement.

Way to go, Dave!

Several important questions remain unresolved:

• Did the arbitrator also order Regan to pay all of the CHA’s legal costs? That could total millions of dollars.

• Who will pay all of millions of dollars of legal bills connected to Regan’s disastrous lawsuit, including the fancy lawyers hired by Regan? Since the suit was filed in Regan’s personal name, shouldn’t he pay for it? Regan will undoubtedly try to push the costs of his bone-headed lawsuit onto SEIU-UHW’s members.

• What about the $34 million that Regan squirreled away inside a secret “partnership” organization? The CHA has demanded that Regan return the money. Their demands are part of legal claims filed with the Superior Court.

Stay tuned.

  SEIU-UHW Dave Regan's request to drop lawsuit against California Hospital Association: June 14, 2017 by tastysternburger on Scribd

Report: Regan Spent Upwards of $1 million of SEIU-UHW Dues on Failed Lawsuits against Hospital Association

Since the collapse of his secretive partnership deal with the California Hospital Association, Dave Regan has spent upwards of $1 million of SEIU-UHW members’ dues money on law firms to represent him in a series of failed lawsuits, according to figures released this week by SEIU-UHW.

The revelations are contained in SEIU-UHW’s annual report to the US Department of Labor, which was signed by Regan on March 30, 2017.

In 2016 alone, Regan delivered $672,049 of SEIU-UHW’s funds to Prometheus Partners LLP, a San Francisco law firm representing him in various lawsuits against the California Hospital Association (CHA). Here’s an excerpt from SEIU-UHW’s Form LM-2 documenting these payments:

Prometheus Partners represents Regan in a lawsuit, “David Regan vs. Duane Dauner,” filed by Regan in February 2016. In January 2017, a judge effectively tossed out Regan’s lawsuit.

Soon thereafter, Regan paid the San Francisco law firm to sue the entire Sacramento County Superior Court. And Regan lost again.

Regan used a separate law firm -- Weinberg, Roger and Rosenfeld -- to file other lawsuits against the CHA, which were also unsuccessful. According to SEIU-UHW’s filing this week, the union paid more than $1.1 million to the Alameda, Calif. firm during 2016. In addition to representing Regan in those suits, the firm also performed other legal services for the union.

Altogether, Regan has spent upwards of $20 million of SEIU-UHW members’ union dues on his so-called CHA strategy, which hinged on negotiating a secret sweetheart deal with hospital CEOs.

Among other provisions, Regan’s deal was designed to force SEIU-UHW members into pre-negotiated labor contracts with stripped-down wages and benefits, to prohibit workers from striking, and to use a far-reaching gag clause to block them from reporting substandard staffing and other patient-care violations to government oversight agencies. In addition to legal fees, Regan spent millions to hire signature-gathering firms in an effort to qualify initiatives for the California ballot.

In addition to costing boatloads of workers’ money, Regan’s dueling lawsuits with the CHA famously landed him in criminal court after he reportedly broke the arm of a process server who was attempting to deliver legal documents to Regan’s Kensington, Calif. home on behalf of the California Hospital Association. It’s unclear whether Regan used the union’s funds to pay for legal representation in this personal criminal matter, which was referred to the District Attorney’s office.

How much of SEIU-UHW members’ dues payments will Regan flush down the toilet in 2017?

We’ll have to wait until next year’s report to answer that question.

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan Loses (Again) to Hospital Association

Dave Regan’s winless streak is now even longer.

On February 17, 2017, an appeals court in California slapped down Regan’s latest legal airball. 

Regan filed the suit last month, just days after a Sacramento County Superior Court judge tossed out Regan’s personal lawsuit against the California Hospital Association (CHA) over his secret “partnership” deal with the CHA.

In response to the judge's action, Regan decided to sue the entire Sacramento County Superior Court in a case called “Regan, etc. v. The Superior Court of Sacramento County.”

In the suit, Regan implored the Court of Appeal for the Third Appellate District to block the judge’s ruling that requires “Wall Street” Dave to undergo yet another round of “binding arbitration” over alleged violations of his secret deal with the CHA.

This time, it took the court only 17 days to whack Regan’s wobbly three-point attempt into the 17th row, according to court records. A copy of the one-sentence decision is below.

What’s next?

It looks like Regan, president of SEIU-UHW, and his erstwhile paramour, Duane Dauner (CEO of the CHA), will soon be perched on the witness stand where they can exchange wistful sighs and furtive glances.

More drama for Dave and Duane.

Stay tuned.

  Court of Appeal Denies SEIU Dave Regan's Suit over the Partnership Deal with California Hospital Associatio... by tastysternburger on Scribd

SEIU’s Dave Regan Loses Another Court Battle to California Hospital Association

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan lost yet another legal battle to the California Hospital Association (CHA) over his secretive, sweetheart deal with hospital CEOs.

On January 13, 2017, a Sacramento County (Calif.) Superior Court judge effectively tossed out Regan’s personal lawsuit against CHA’s CEO, Duane Dauner, and three other CHA officials. Instead, the judge ordered Regan’s allegations to be sent to binding arbitration, as required by Regan’s secret 2014 “partnership” deal with the CHA.

A copy of the judge’s decision is below.

Regan’s suit, initially filed on November 24, 2015, alleges that four top leaders of the CHA violated their “fiduciary duties,” committed “dishonest acts and gross abuses of authority and discretion,” and carried out “unlawful conduct” by “undermining” Regan’s scheme to secure billions more dollars of Medicaid funding for California’s hospital corporations.

Why was Regan trying to put more taxpayer money in hospital corporations’ pockets?

It was one of the requirements of his secret deal with the CHA. Specifically, hospital CEOs required Regan to deliver $6 billion a year in additional revenues to California hospital corporations as the price for “buying” special treatment from CEOs during SEIU unionization campaigns.

And that’s not the only concession Regan gave to hospital CEOs.

 

Dave Regan and Duane Dauner

He also agreed to force any newly organized workers into cheap, pre-negotiated SEIU-UHW labor contracts that included a ban on strikes and a far-reaching gag clause barring SEIU-UHW from criticizing hospital companies and their gold-plated executives.

Regan’s lawsuit is yet another piece of the paper trail documenting “Wall Street” Dave’s backroom deals with hospital CEOs.

The suit also offers a window into the internal battles raging between SEIU’s officials. For example, Regan’s lawsuit says Dauner met “secretly” with officials from SEIU to “undermine” Regan’s Medicaid funding scheme.

Which SEIU officials?

LaPhonza Butler (President of SEIU Local 2015) and Jon Youngdahl (former Executive Director of SEIU California State Council), says Regan.

According to Regan’s suit, SEIU officials undercut him by telling Dauner that “UHW and its president, Plaintiff Regan, would soon lose half its membership and that Defendant Dauner needed to deal with Butler and the SEIU State Council – not Regan and UHW – if he wanted to accomplish any legislative and policy goals that were important to CHA’s members.”

Jon Youngdahl

Last spring, Tasty published a leaked 30-page document containing the questions that SEIU-UHW attorneys posed to Dauner during a closed-door legal proceeding, including grilling him about Dauner’s meetings with SEIU’s LaPhonza Butler and Jon Youngdahl.

Elsewhere in the suit, Regan alleges that Dauner “sabotaged” him and “hid” his activities from Regan and others.

Regan’s suit seeks Dauner’s removal from the board of directors of “Caring for Californians,” a partnership organization jointly established by CHA and SEIU-UHW following their 2014 deal. The organization was funded with $50 million that Regan and Dauner diverted from their organizations’ coffers.

Regan and Dauner are the Co-Chairs of “Caring for Californians.” The remaining seats on its Board of Directors are split evenly between CHA and SEIU-UHW. That’s why Regan also sued Greg Adams (Group President at Kaiser Permanente), Mark Laret (CEO of UCSF Medical Center), and James Holmes (CEO of Redlands Community Hospital). They’re CHA’s appointees to the “Caring for Californians” board, and Regan alleges they, too, committed “unlawful conduct” and violations of their fiduciary duties.

So who did Regan appoint to fill SEIU-UHW’s seats on the board?

Three SEIU-UHW staffers: Dave Kieffer, Cass Gualvez, and Arianna Jimenez.

With last month’s ruling in Sacramento Superior Court, Regan has maintained a perfect winless record in the multiple lawsuits that followed the collapse of his secret deal with the CHA.

In June of 2016, for example, a Superior Court judge ordered SEIU-UHW to withdraw a statewide initiative from the California ballot or face millions of dollars in penalties. In November 2016, the court ordered SEIU-UHW to submit to binding arbitration over Regan’s refusal to return $34 million to CHA and SEIU-UHW.

 

LaPhonza Butler

What’s next for Dave?

Regan, who is rumored to be stepping down from his position as SEIU-UHW’s president, apparently will be wrapped up in lawsuits for the foreseeable future.  

At least one question remains unclear. 

Who will fund Regan’s lawsuits after he steps down? In the suit discussed in this post, Regan sued as an individual, not as SEIU-UHW. Should SEIU-UHW’s members continue to pay tens of thousands of dollars to litigate Regan’s personal lawsuit? 

  Judge Orders Arbitration in Lawsuit by Dave Regan (SEIU-UHW) vs. California Hospital Association: 01-13-201... by tastysternburger on Scribd

Judge: SEIU-UHW's Dave Regan Must Submit to Binding Arbitration over Missing $34 Million

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan has lost another court battle against the California Hospital Association (CHA).  

Last Friday, a judge ordered SEIU-UHW to submit to binding arbitration over $34 million that Regan squirreled away inside a secret “partnership” organization. A copy of the judge’s order, issued November 18, 2016, is pasted below. In September, Tasty described the CHA’s lawsuit to recover the millions that Regan is sitting on.

Where does the money come from?

In 2014, Regan and CHA’s Duane Dauner signed their secret partnership deal and also agreed to create a secret new organization to carry out joint projects. 

How was the organization funded? 

Regan and Dauner diverted a combined $50 million from their respective organizations’ treasuries and steered the massive haul of cash into the secret group, named “Caring for Californians.”

In late 2015, Regan’s partnership with the CHA collapsed. Under the terms of the secret deal (detailed in the so-called “Code of Conduct”), the remaining unspent portion of the $50 million was supposed to be returned to SEIU-UHW and CHA. That was supposed to happen on January 1, 2016.

However, Regan -- in an apparent fit of vindictiveness -- refused to return the money to either organization. Instead, he has allowed the money (including SEIU-UHW’s portion, totaling $6.9 million) to be frittered away on no-show jobs, unused offices in Sacramento, an expensive Executive Director, etc. 

So, CHA sued to get its money back.

On Friday, November 18, a judge issued a five-page ruling (see below) siding with CHA and ordering SEIU-UHW and Regan to submit to binding arbitration over the $34 million. Here’s an excerpt from the judge’s decision. The term “CFC” refers to “Caring for Californians,” the secret partnership organization holding the $34 million.

In December 2015, the [Code of Conduct] Agreement terminated pursuant to its terms, and CFC has had no ongoing work. The CFC continues to spend approximately $40,000 per month on operating expenses. CHA has requested that UHW agree to redistribute the unencumbered CFC funds, but UHW has refused. As of September 2016, CFC has approximately $34 million in its accounts that is not currently encumbered, thus $27.2 million would be returned to CHA and $6.87 million would be returned to UHW.

CHA's arbitration complaint alleges that UHW breached the Agreement by refusing to agree to the return of the unencumbered funds. CHA's complaint apparently seeks an "order compelling UHW to agree to the redistribution of funds, or, in lieu of UHW's agreement, an order directing the redistribution of the funds."

…the petition to compel arbitration is GRANTED.

If Regan loses the arbitration, SEIU-UHW will be forced to return the money and pay expensive legal fees to CHA.

This latest lawsuit offers yet another window onto Regan's collusive, backroom deals with employers that represent Dollar Dave's primary mode of operation. The lawsuit once again raises questions like these: 

• Why is SEIU-UHW, one of California's largest healthcare workers' unions, pooling $50 million with the hospital industry's Chamber of Commerce? 
• Why is one of SEIU's main leaders signing secret deals that are hidden from SEIU's own members?
• What other deals has SEIU-UHW signed with employers that have not yet been revealed?

Stay tuned 

  Judge Orders SEIU-UHW to Submit to Arbitration under secret agreement with California Hospital Association:... by tastysternburger on Scribd

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan Misfires (AGAIN) on Ballot Initiative

Dave Regan, president of SEIU-UHW, has committed another embarrassing ballot-initiative blunder.

In February of 2016, soon after his secret partnership with the California Hospital Association (CHA) exploded in flames, Regan filed a ballot initiative in Arizona designed to cap hospital executives’ salaries. Regan hoped the initiative would pressure several large multi-state hospital companies to convince CHA's Duane Dauner to ink another deal with him.

The Arizona initiative, “The Hospital Executive Compensation Act,” is virtually identical to a ballot measure Regan has filed repeatedly and unsuccessfully in California.

Beginning early in 2016, Regan spent massive amounts of SEIU-UHW members’ dues money to hire paid circulators to collect 281,000 signatures from Arizona voters to qualify the measure for the ballot.

However, Regan apparently forgot to make sure the signature-gatherers were actually legally qualified to collect signatures. D’OH!!

Under Arizona law, paid signature-gatherers must register with the Secretary of State’s office and provide an Arizona address.

This summer, when Regan triumphantly filed his 281,000 signatures with state officials, the ballot measure’s opponents quickly noticed that many signature-gatherers had not complied with state law. They sued SEIU-UHW in Maricopa County Superior Court to disqualify the signatures and thereby invalidate the initiative.

In August, just one day before a judge was set to hear the lawsuit, Regan threw in the towel and withdrew his initiative.

In news articles, including this one in the Arizona Capitol Times (“Backers of Hospital Exec Pay Cap Initiative Dropping Effort,” August 15, 2016), opponents celebrated Regan’s formidable f*ck-up. They said SEIU-UHW’s decision to withdraw the initiative “proves that the concerns about the validity of petition signatures were valid.”

 

Dave "Signature Man" Regan

This, of course, is not Regan’s first multi-million dollar mistake.

In June, a Sacramento Superior Court Judge ordered Regan to withdraw a nearly identical initiative from next Tuesday’s California ballot because it violated a gag clause that Regan himself secretly signed with the California Hospital Association. 

Regan's gag clause -- which he refused to show to SEIU-UHW's Executive Board -- prohibited the union from “raising concerns about… executive compensation in health care” and blocked SEIU-UHW from supporting any legislation, initiative, or regulatory action "adverse to the California hospital industry."

In late June, Regan was forced to dump his California initiative after having spent at least $5 million of SEIU-UHW members’ dues to collect voters’ signatures.

In 2012, Regan was forced to withdraw yet another ballot initiative after the Los Angeles Times discovered that Regan had inserted hidden loopholes in the initiative’s legal language designed to exempt two giant hospital corporations -- which control 25% of California’s hospitals -- from the new requirements.

And earlier this year, Dishonest Dave snatched TV headlines by allegedly assaulting a process server trying to deliver legal records to Regan’s home on behalf of the California Hospital Association.

How does the saying go about the gang that can’t shoot straight?

Maybe SEIU-UHW members should ask Dave to refund all the money he’s pissed down the drain via his f*ck-ups, sell-outs and failures, which now tallies more than $30 million by Tasty’s count.

Here’s another question. Why is Regan still collecting a paycheck? After all, would your boss keep you on the job if you repeatedly screwed up at a cost of millions and millions of dollars?

Back in Court: California Hospital Association Sues SEIU-UHW for Millions Locked up in Covert Partnership Organization

The California Hospital Association (CHA) has taken SEIU-UHW to court… again.

This time, CHA is trying to recover tens of millions of dollars that SEIU-UHW has locked away inside a secret “partnership” organization, according to records obtained from Sacramento County Superior Court. (Below is a full copy.)

On October 14, CHA’s and SEIU-UHW’s attorneys will face off in a Sacramento courthouse.

Here’s what’s happening.

When SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan and CHA’s Duane Dauner signed their secret partnership deal in 2014, they also agreed to set up and finance a secret new organization to carry out their joint projects.

The new organization’s first priority was to help SEIU-UHW convince politicians to steer $6 billion a year in new Medicaid funds to California’s giant hospital corporations.

 

Dave Regan and Duane Dauner

If SEIU-UHW had succeeded in this task (they didn’t), then the hospital CEOs would have allowed SEIU-UHW to unionize 30,000 of their employees… but only as long as the workers were banned from striking, forced into cheap labor contracts, and silenced by a massive gag clause.

The covert partnership organization -- ironically named “Caring for Californians” by its founders -- was funded with $50 million that Regan and Dauner diverted from their treasuries in 2014.

With millions in its bank count, “Caring for Californians” leased office space in Sacramento, hired Peter Ragone as its Executive Director, hired attorneys and staff, etc. The organization was soon spending $40,000 a month in operating expenses, according to court filings by the CHA.

For a time, things were going swimmingly for Wall Street Dave. Fantasies of his class-collaborationist partnership danced through his head as he performed late-night lap dances for some of California’s wealthiest corporate CEOs.

Peter Ragone, CFC's Executive Director

By November of 2015, however, Dave’s partnership had exploded in a fiery display that lit up California’s skies. The partnership was dead!  

At the time of the partnership’s demise, “Caring for Californians” still had $34 million in unspent cash sitting in its bank account.

And that’s what the latest lawsuit is all about. The $34 million.

Under the terms of Regan and Dauner’s secret partnership deal, the $34 was supposed to be returned to CHA and SEIU-UHW on January 1, 2016. However, Regan -- in an apparent fit of vindictiveness against his former pin-striped pals -- is refusing to return the money to either organization.

According to CHA’s lawsuit, Regan has vetoed any return of the money to both CHA and SEIU-UHW.

How?

“Caring for Californians” is run by an eight-person Board of Directors, with equal numbers of seats filled by CHA and SEIU-UHW. Regan and Dauner are co-chairs of the board. Since January of 2016, says CHA, Regan has used his four votes (one of them is SEIU-UHW staffer Arianna Jimenez) to block every proposal to return the $34 million.

So what’s happening to the money?

It’s simply swirling down the drain, says CHA. 

Here’s an excerpt from a recent CHA legal filing, which refers to “Caring for Californians” by its initials “CFC.” The term "Code of Conduct" refers to the secret partnership deal signed in 2014.

“On December 31, 2015, the Code of Conduct terminated pursuant to its terms. Since that time, CFC has had no ongoing work, and neither CHA, UHW, nor any CFC Director has made any efforts to initiate new endeavors. Nonetheless, CFC has continued to spend approximately $40,000 each month on operating expenses for resources and services it has not been using. These are not only unnecessary expenditures, but they also decrease the amount available for redistribution to both CHA and UHW as provided by the Code of Conduct.” (p. 3)

Interesting, right?

 

SEIU-UHW's Arianna Jimenez

Regan is so vindictive he’s willing to piss millions of dollars of SEIU-UHW members’ money down the drain to get back at CHA.

How much money do SEIU-UHW members stand to lose? According to the CHA:

“As of September 1, 2016, the CFC has approximately $34 million in its accounts that is not currently encumbered. Pursuant to the terms of the Code of Conduct, approximately $27.2 million would be returned to CHA and approximately $6.8 million would be returned to UHW.” (p. 4)

What’s CHA asking the judge to do?

CHA’s lawsuit asks the judge to force SEIU-UHW into binding arbitration so it can recover its $27.2 million. Plus, it wants SEIU-UHW to pay all of CHA’s attorneys fees.

If history is a judge, it looks like SEIU-UHW’s members will be footing the bill for yet another idiotic blunder by Regan.

Here’s a copy of CHA’s suit filed on September 6, 2016:

  California Hospital Association's lawsuit versus SEIU-UHW over $34 Million Locked in Secret Partnershi...

SEIU-UHW's Dave Regan Attempts Dizzying Flip Flop That's Got Observers Scratching Their Heads

 

SEIU-UHW’s Dave Regan, still reeling from the collapse of his secret partnership with the California Hospital Association, is now attempting a flip-flop of dizzying dimensions.

Just months ago, Regan was working hand-in-hand with the California Hospital Association (CHA) to boost Medicaid reimbursement rates for hospitals across the state.

Regan bussed SEIU-UHW members to legislators’ offices to push for higher Medicaid payments (called “Medi-Cal” in California). 

Last summer, he teamed up with the CHA to hold a “Medi-Cal Matters” rally on the steps of the state capitol (see pic below).

And that was just the beginning.

SEIU-UHW's "Medi-Cal Champion" Sen. Ed Hernandez

SEIU-UHW launched a multi-million-dollar “Medi-Cal Matters” media campaign with TV and newspaper ads, billboards, and beaucoup bells and whistles. 

SEIU-UHW even handed out “Medi-Cal Champion” awards to legislators who pledged to support Medi-Cal payments, including Sen. Ed Hernandez (pictured at right).

Not anymore.

Last month -- just days after a Superior Court judge ordered Regan to withdraw his ballot initiative -- Regan angrily announced that SEIU-UHW was setting aside $8 million to fight a Medi-Cal funding initiative that just months ago, umm, Regan wholeheartedly supported.

Dave’s fantabulous flip flop has many people scratching their heads.

After all, why would a union of hospital workers try to jeopardize $3 billion of federal matching funds for California hospitals? Isn’t that money kinda helpful for funding SEIU-UHW members’ pay and benefits?

SEIU-UHW/CHA Medi-Cal Rally: 2015

Regan apparently thinks his campaign to defeat the November 2016 ballot measure -- the “California Medi-Cal Hospital Reimbursement Initiative” (Proposition 52) -- is a “genius” move that’ll really piss off his former pals at the CHA.

Others don’t seem to think so.

In fact, virtually every union in the state supports Prop. 52.

In recent days, Regan and his chief political hack, Dave Kieffer, suffered a big setback when they failed miserably to convince the California AFL-CIO (known as the “California Federation of Labor”) to oppose Proposition 52. 

Instead, the AFL-CIO endorsed Proposition 52.

What’s next?

Stay tuned to watch Regan steer SEIU-UHW down another dead-end alley with no-win solutions for his union's members. 

Dave Regan: "I supported Medi-Cal before I opposed it."

California Governor: I refuse to meet with SEIU-UHW's Dave Regan

California Gov. Jerry Brown

What do California’s top political and union leaders think about SEIU-UHW President Dave Regan?

Not much.

That’s one of the intriguing findings in a 42-page decision issued last month by the arbitrator who investigated the dispute between SEIU-UHW and the California Hospital Association.

According to the arbitrator’s report, California Gov. Jerry Brown -- who is scheduled to speak at next week’s Democratic National Convention -- refused to be in the same room with Regan. Ditto for the California Teachers Association and the SEIU California State Council.

Why do they dislike Regan so much?

It turns out that Regan betrayed them by attempting to raid billions of dollars set aside for California’s chronically underfunded schools.

Here’s what happened.

In 2012, the governor joined the teachers union and many other civic organizations in successfully passing a ballot initiative that established a “Millionaire’s Tax” to improve funding for California’s schools. The tax, also called “Proposition 30,” will expire in 2018.

Last year, the California Teachers Association began openly preparing to file a new ballot initiative to extend California’s “Millionaire’s Tax” and its funding for schools.

Dave Regan

As the teachers began their efforts, Regan eyed an opportunity. 

Under the terms of his secret partnership with the California Hospital Association, Regan was under the gun to deliver billions of dollars of new government funding to hospital CEOs in order to buy their consent to unionize 30,000 of the hospitals’ non-union employees.

Regan, rather than supporting the schools, introduced a separate ballot initiative to snatch $2.5 billion a year from the schools and put it into the pockets of the hospital CEOs with whom he’d secretly been conspiring.

In June of 2015, Regan asked the California Hospital Association (CHA) to join him in filing the competing ballot initiative. Here’s what happened next, according to the arbitrator’s report:

"CHA representatives expressed surprise and raised a number of concerns about the Union's proposal, including the likelihood that the California Teachers Association (CTA), the so-called "ABC Coalition" and the Governor would be angry and unhappy if the LMC [SEIU-UHW and the CHA] were to file a competing statewide tax increase initiative. In particular, CHA expressed concern that competing Proposition 30 initiatives would undermine each other, decreasing the opportunity of either passing." (pp. 11-12)

SEIU-UHW nonetheless filed its competing ballot initiative.

Next, Regan tried to engage Gov. Brown and the teachers union in negotiations over a compromise ballot initiative that would steer billion to his hospital CEO pals. 

Regan asked CHA CEO Duane Dauner to reach out to the Governor’s office. He also called on Peter Ragone and former California Senate President Darrell Steinberg to reach out to the California Teachers Association (CTA) and the SEIU California State Council, which was working with the CTA.

How did they respond to Regan’s plea?

Here’s what the arbitrator wrote in his decision:

"Despite efforts by CHA to have UHW and the LMC included in the discussions, both the Governor's office and the other stakeholders, including CTA and the SEIU State Council, continued to insist that they would not meet with UHW or the LMC, but only with CHA separately." (p. 13)

Ouch. (The term “LMC” refers to the “Labor-Management Committee” that SEIU-UHW and the CHA set up to carry out their secret partnership deal. Duane Dauner and Dave Regan were the co-chairs of the LMC.)

Gov. Brown campaigning for Prop 30

Several months later, Regan begged the Governor, the CTA, and other “stakeholders” to allow SEIU-UHW to join them in a single ballot initiative. But they again refused. The arbitrator says it was “clear that the other stakeholders would not modify their position of opposition to UHW’s involvement.” (p. 13)

In November, the CHA announced its support for the teachers’ ballot initiative. According to the arbitrator, the CHA’s Duane Dauner phoned Regan on November 3, 2015 and “explained to representatives of UHW that the new coalition was not willing to work with UHW and that they, therefore, could not be part of the coalition.” (p. 19)

The arbitrator’s decision makes multiple other references to statewide leaders’ apparently extreme dislike for Regan:

“...it was the stakeholders that insisted UHW was not welcome.” (p. 22)

“UHW was generally aware that.. the Governor's office, CTA and other stakeholders were unwilling to meet with UHW or to allow UHW to join their coalition.” (pp. 23-24)

Elsewhere, the arbitrator refers to “UHW's apparently strained relationship with the governor and the SEIU State Council.”

We all know what happened next. When Regan failed to deliver the billions of dollars he’d promised to his CEO pals, his secret partnership deal with the Hospital Association exploded in flames.

Dave Regan and the gang that can't shoot straight

In an angry response to his former CEO pals, Regan filed a new ballot initiative designed to cap their salaries at $450,000 a year. 

Unfortunately, Regan forgot to read the gag clause that he’d signed as part of his secret partnership deal, which legally blocked SEIU-UHW from taking any action "adverse" to the interests of the hospital industry.

Last month, after Regan had already wasted $5 million of SEIU-UHW members’ dues money to collect signatures for his doomed executive-compensation ballot initiative, a Superior Court judge ordered Regan to withdraw the initiative or face tens of millions of dollars of penalties.

Altogether, it was quite a remarkable series of failures and f*ck-ups by Regan and his chief political strategist, Dave Kieffer.

As one observer remarked: “It looks like Dave Regan is chief gunner for the gang that can’t shoot straight.”