A Costly 'Call'
Active military duty can cut deeply into family income; an AFSCME member responded by successfully lobbying for pay protection.
By Jimmie Turner
Can you imagine a pay cut of $30,000? That kind of hit can spell near disaster for a household budget. That's the amount Jim Larson and his family lost over nearly two years.
Larson, a state trooper and until recently a proud member of Council 24, serves with the Wisconsin Air National Guard's security forces, and he was deployed to support the invasion of Iraq. The difference between his state patrol salary and military pay was more than $1,500 a month. Although proud to serve his country, a burden that heavy seemed to him unfair. To get by in his absence, the family had to drain the oldest daughter's college fund.
"My family was really spectacular," he says. "It was bare minimum for two years, and they never asked for the vacations, the big Christmas presents. My kids were forced to realize that money doesn't grow on trees. They didn't whine or mope about it at all. It was, 'This is the hand we're dealt; we'll deal with it.'"
So instead of catching up with his wife and three children during priceless, twice-weekly 15-minute phone conversations from overseas, Larson's calls centered on financial worries.
When he returned home in June 2003, Larson told his story to Wisconsin lawmakers and they listened. On March 17, 2004, Gov. Jim Doyle (D) signed a bill that will make up the difference in pay for state employees called to active duty by the Guard or Reserve.
BEHIND THE TIMES. After a major drawdown of active-duty personnel in the early 1990s, the streamlined military has relied largely on reserve forces to support missions around the globe. In the Vietnam War, fewer than 1 percent of the U.S. troops deployed to support the campaign were from the Guard and Reserve. Today, nearly 40 percent of those groups — the nation's "weekend warriors" — have been called up to fight in Iraq and Afghanistan. And they're being asked to serve longer. Some critics call it the new draft.
Others blame the Bush administration's failure to increase the size of the active-duty forces to meet current challenges for the Pentagon's over reliance on reserves. In the Los Angeles Times in January, House Majority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) blasted long-term deployments of the Guard and Reserve, stating that the troops have essentially become "permanent forces."
Some state and local laws, as well as military infrastructure, have not kept pace with the increased weekend-warrior call-ups. Many reserves are therefore not getting benefits equal to those of their active-duty counterparts. But states are taking action. In Illinois, for example, Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) signed a bill in 2003 that allows employees of local governments to con-tinue to accrue seniority and benefits during a military leave of absence; state employees already have the same protections under Council 31's contract. In Delaware, state employees called to active duty will receive their state salary less their military pay.
The armed forces were also unprepared for the return of wounded reserve personnel to American soil. Thousands have had to wait weeks or even months to receive proper treatment for their injuries. Since they're still considered "active," they can't go home until they get medical clearance.
At Fort Stewart, Ga., and Fort Knox, Ky., those men and women have had to endure living in World War II-era buildings with leaking roofs, communal showers and toilets, no running water, and animal infestations. Not until United Press International reported on the abominable conditions at Fort Stewart were the suffering residents housed in hotels and assigned more doctors.
SILENT NO MORE. In March 2001, Larson joined the military because "it was just the right thing to do," he says. "I felt unpatriotic because I wasn't doing something for my country." His father fought in the Korean War, his grandfather in World War I. Larson and two other Wisconsin state troopers were deployed together to Kuwait, where they often discussed the pay disparity and how something needed to be done. With limited Internet access overseas, Larson says he e-mailed state legislators and "anybody who would listen." Just before returning home, he got a phone call telling him that Governor Doyle was set to introduce a bill that would resolve the pay issue.
In June 2003, Larson and Todd Weinberger — another state trooper — decided to attend a public hearing at the state assembly. The pair didn't view themselves as astute political operatives, so they had no intentions of speaking to the panel, but their wives' common sense prevailed.
"Our wives ended up talking us into it the night before," Larson recalls. "Given the amount of money we lost and what we've been through, they said, 'if you can't convince them, nobody can.'"
As the measure meandered through the assembly and the senate, the governor invited Larson to attend the state-of-the-state address in January 2004, and singled him out for his efforts in behalf of reservist pay equity. The following month, Larson testified before a senate committee to help push the proposal along. The bill became law in March 2004 — retroactive to Jan. 1, 2003. The Larsons were able to recoup about a third of their losses.
Larson is of course pleased, yet low key, about his achievement: "My thought on state government before was, 'That's the big guy you don't change.' But we made a change, and it was for the better."
