By Paul Fong. Completing my first two-year term has been exciting to me as your president. I was very fortunate to have Walt Soellner as vice president and Ron Levesque as the treasurer. Their service on the Executive Board is greatly appreciated by me and members of the AFT 6157R.

By Kathy Jasper. When Paul Fong was unable to attend the California Federation of Teacher’s convention in San Francisco this spring, I was lucky to be selected to represent our local.  I got to hear about the many ways the California Federation of Teachers (CFT) is working with their retirement community.

By Kathy Jasper. A big thank you to California State Senator Dave Cortese who authored California Retired Teachers Association’s (CalRTA) Senate Joint Resolution 1, which calls for the US Congress to repeal the Windfall Elimination Provision and Government Pension Offset (WEP/GPO).

By Ron Levesque. Hired in 1996 to teach English at Evergreen Valley College, Steven Mentor has come to know our college district well, but since becoming union president in 2022, he has learned so much more about its strengths and weaknesses, and its potential.

By Patrick Butler. First, a quick review, for those new to the subject of the 47 million dollars in bonds sold by the SJECC District back in 2008. The DO managers pushed the unions to require all retired faculty and staff to qualify for Medicare after reaching the age of 65.

By Patrick Butler. The last Interim Chancellor, Raul Rodriguez, turned down the RBOA request to pay the basic charge for Medicare ($165. per month) saying that such payments were prohibited by the old CTA and AFT contract language.

By Kathy Jasper. Congratulations to counselor Gam Nguyen, engineering instructor Abdie Tabrizi, psychology instructor Leslie Williams, all at EVC, and cosmetology instructor Roxie Banks at SJCC. We hope your retirements are filled with all the pleasurable activities you postponed while you were working so hard.