Council Member Marte on municipal retiree healthcare protection bill

Thank you.

Councilmember Marte, followed by Epstein.

Thank you, Majority Leader.

Today I'm proud to reintroduce Intro 1008, legislation to protect the health care of New York City municipal retirees.

For decades, our retirees served this city with the understanding that when they retire, the health care they earn would be there for them.

Yet, after years of uncertainty, they remain vulnerable to future efforts to privatize their care, restrict which doctors they can see, or impose new co-pays and other out-of-pocket costs.

This bill will make sure that that cannot happen.

It prohibits the city from diminishing health care coverage for Medicare-eligible retirees and their dependents, including by forcing them into

privatized Medicare plans with limited provider networks or increasing what they have to pay for care.

And I want to be very clear.

This legislation does not undermine collective bargaining.

The bill explicitly preserves the right of unions to negotiate terms and conditions for employment, including future retirement benefits for active employees they represent.

As we work towards the larger goal of universal health care, where nobody access to a doctor depends on their employer, income, or insurance company, we cannot allow health care people already earned to be taken away.

Progress cannot mean moving backwards for our retirees.

The immediate Medicare

proposal may be off the table where retirees should not have to spend the rest of their lives worrying whether the health care they depend on will be taken away by the next administration or one after.

The council has a responsibility to provide that certainty.

I urge my colleagues to join us, sign on to Intro 1008, stand with our retirees, and protect the health care that they earn through decades of service in this city.

Thank you.