On Wednesday, Jan. 4, employees at the Mercy Health Partners Hackley campus in Muskegon are scheduled to get a chance to vote themselves out of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU). The specific branch of the SEIU involved is Healthcare Michigan.

The election, which would involve about 95 workers, has been a long time coming. In March, the workers at the Hackley Campus in Muskegon and the Luther Manor skilled nursing facility in Saginaw filed petitions for the elections with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Their goal was to switch to the National Union of Healthcare Workers (NUHW).

The Saginaw workers voted themselves out of Healthcare Michigan in September. However, it took longer for an election to be scheduled for the Muskegon group.

“We're looking forward to the election and we'll win in a landslide,” said Hasan Zahdeh, a Cardiovascular Interventional Technologist and outspoken critic of the SEIU and Healthcare Michigan. “The union filed to try to block the election, but we're going forward with it.”

A major point of contention Zahdeh and other Hackley staff members have with Healthcare Michigan is their claim that the union appeared to be more interested in collecting dues than in serving its members. This includes allegations that the union has often failed to reply to the members' phone calls and emails.

Roughly 30 days prior to the election, Zahdeh's employment at the facility was terminated. He told Capitol Confidential that he is appealing the termination and believes Healthcare Michigan pursued the termination as retribution for his activist efforts to switch unions.

“SEIU was trying to negotiate my job away in late November,” Zahdeh said. “I was terminated on Dec. 2. I've filed a grievance over the termination, but the union seems to be dragging its feet on it.”

Zahdeh said he couldn't discus his termination in detail.

SEIU's Healthcare Michigan is currently the state's largest local health care union, with 55,000 members. The union seemed poised to lose more than 40,000 due-paying members when the state legislature de-funded the Michigan Quality Community Care Council (MQ3), as of Oct. 1, 2011.

MQC3 was the alleged employer of the 40,000-plus people described as “home health care workers” pressed into the SEIU through forced unionization under then Gov. Jennifer Granholm. Although MQC3 was de-funded as of Oct. 1, it is still active and dues from the so-called “home health care workers” continue to be collected.

The brief three-year history of Healthcare Michigan has been tinged with corruption and allegations of corruption. Within a couple months of being named President of Healthcare Michigan by Granholm, Rickman Jackson was forced out of office on Oct. 15, 2008.

That story received almost no news media coverage in Michigan – possibly because it was buried beneath stories about the '08 national election. However, it was covered by the Los Angeles Times.

Jackson's replacement, Marge Faville, reportedly has a $163,000 salary, a $47,000 union-provided SUV and has been accused of nepotism.

Zac Altefogt, spokesperson for SEIU's Healthcare Michigan, did not respond to a request for comment.

The salaries of Michigan’s emergency financial managers are being questioned across the state. But how does EM compensation compare to other state employees' salaries?

The headline in the Flint Journal reads: “State-appointed emergency managers make six figures at local community’s expense.”

The annual pay for the four emergency managers in charge of cities follows: Flint ($170,000), Ecorse ($132,000), Benton Harbor ($132,000) and Pontiac ($150,000). Detroit Public Schools’ Roy Roberts was given a $250,000 salary but took a 10-percent pay cut.

The article quoted State Rep. Woodrow Stanley, D-Flint, as saying the salaries appear to be “exorbitant pay.”

Yet one public policy expert says many are forgetting why an emergency financial manager had to be appointed in the first place.

“If these cities had not fouled their own nest, it would not be necessary to compensate emergency financial managers at any level,” said Michael LaFaive, director of the Morey Fiscal Policy Initiative at the Mackinac Center for Public Policy.

LaFaive believes the criticism of the emergency financial manager pay is probably more about the controversial law than the salary.

There are many municipal employees, not as high ranking, who make much more than the emergency financial managers.

Jim Wilson is the general manager of the Blue Water Area Transit – the bus system in Port Huron. He made $137,797 in 2011 and oversees 84 employees.

Peter Varga, CEO of The Rapid – Grand Rapids' transit company – made $193,010 in 2010. The Rapid has 308 employees.

Ann Arbor Transportation Authority CEO Michael Ford made $183,895 in 2010. The AATA has 171 employees.

In 2010, then-president and CEO of the MEDC Greg Main had the top salary, at $200,000. Debra Dansby, then the MEDC’s chief operating officer, had the second-highest salary at $150,000.

Michael Finney was hired in 2011 as the new CEO of the MEDC and has a salary of $250,000.

Detroit Zoological Society Director Ron Kagan made $231,461 in 2009, the latest year salary information was available. The Detroit Zoo had 384 employees in 2009.

Robert Bobb, former Detroit public school emergency financial manager, made $280,000 in 2010. However, there were 10 other superintendents that made $200,000 or more in 2010.

LaFaive said if the critics of emergency financial managers’ compensation believe the pay is out of line with what the private market would pay for a similar position, then that standard should apply to all municipal employees.