Marge Faville, head of Healthcare Michigan, the union that functions with dollars extracted from Medicaid checks, got a 7.3 percent raise last year.

She wasn't the only one. Most of the top officials in Healthcare Michigan garnered raises as well.

On March 30, Healthcare Michigan turned in its annual disclosure report to the national Office of Labor Management Standards. According to the report, Faville's annual salary increased from $144,154 in 2010 to $155,489 in 2011. When disbursements for office business were added in, her pay in 2011 totaled $171,974. Faville's salary increased 14.6 percent between 2008 (when it was $122,700) and 2011.

Healthcare Michigan, an affiliate of the Service Employees International Union, gets dues from tens of thousands of Michigan's so-called home health care workers. The vast majority of these “workers” are people who take care of homebound relatives or friends.

In 2005, these caregivers were netted into the union under a scheme that included a dummy employer and an unpublicized election. Continuation of the dues flow to the union is called the “home health care dues skim.” To date, the SEIU has collected more than $29 million that has been taken from so-called home health care workers.

Michigan's legislature has passed legislation (Senate Bill 1018) drafted to end the “skim.” It has been sent to Gov. Rick Snyder.

Meanwhile, the SEIU has taken steps toward mounting a petition drive to try to lock the unionization behind the “skim” into the state constitution.

Healthcare Michigan's 2011 annual report, called an “LM-2,” lists the amount of dues and fees collected as $11,974,800. All of the union's members are not home caregivers. Some are legitimate union members who work at facilities around the state. These members pay a higher dues rate. Of the $11,974,800 total, $7,130,343 was paid to the SEIU national union in Washington, D.C., as a “per capita tax.”

Both Healthcare Michigan's 2010 LM-2 and its 2011 LM-2 list the rates of its dues and fees as “NA” (not available).

In addition to Faville, several other members of the top brass at SEIU Healthcare Michigan received pay increases in 2011. Some employees listed in the report received less pay in 2011 than in 2010. Not all of the employees who received increases are highlighted in this article. On top of the regular pay, the report also listed what the employees received “with allowances and disbursements.” These are denoted as (w-a-d).

Secretary Treasurer Johnnie M. Jolliffi was paid a salary of $131,238 (total w-a-d $139,270) in 2010. In 2011, she received a raise, getting $139,871 (total w-a-d $147,156). Recording Secretary Sheila Gunn got paid $65,605 (total w-a-d $72,290) in 2010. It was increased in 2011 to $74,356 (total w-a-d $81,057).

Director of government affairs for the union, Robert Allison, is also on the Michigan League of Human Services board. In 2010, Allison was paid $87,863 by the union (total w-a-d $96,649). In 2011, it was bumped up to $91,359 (total w-a-d $102,007). Allison was involved with the union as far back as 2005.

Chief of Staff Mark Raleigh had a $93,003 salary in 2010 (total w-a-d $100,424). In 2011, it was boosted to $96,733 (total w-a-d $107,516).

Director of Finance Charles Labaito had a salary of $80,215 (total w-a-d $87,505) in 2010. In 2011, he got $82,375 (total w-a-d $89,778), but it was listed under disbursements to employees.

Loretta Briggs was listed as executive board chief of staff in the 2010 report, when she received $64,172 (total w-a-d $72,497). In 2011, Briggs was listed as “administration.” She got an increase to $65,510 (total w-a-d $73,161).

Luke Canfora, political director, was paid $44,615 (total w-a-d $ 47,165) in 2010. In 2011, that jumped to $80,000, (total w-a-d $85,100).

Marcella Clark, an organizer, had a salary of $64,172 (total w-a-d $70,844) in 2010. She got an increase in 2011 to $70,454 (total w-a-d $78,697). She was involved in an action against the SEIU back in 2003. 

Freddy Polanco Marte, listed as a home care director, had a salary of $62,002 (total w-a-d $70,132) in 2010. In 2011, he got a raise to $64,488 (total w-a-d  $72,305).

John Freeman was on the union's payroll in 2011 as a state council member and was paid $54,750  (total w-a-d $58,575). Freeman was the former ACORN community organizer who penciled in the dummy employer for the unionization back in 2005.

A repeated complaint critics of Healthcare Michigan have alleged about the union is nepotism. La Rohns Joliffi is listed in the report as having received disbursements of $33,442 (total w-a-d $40,182) in 2011. However, according to news accounts, the correct name is LaRohn Jolliffi, with the last name spelled the same as that of the secretary treasurer, Johnnie Jolliffi.

Zachary Altefogt, head of communications, had a $72,336 salary in 2010 (total w-a-d $80,004).  In 2011, he received $83,077, listed under disbursements to employees, (total w-a-d $89,677). Altefogt has not returned emails or phone calls seeking comment for several dozen Michigan Capitol Confidential articles about his employer.

Altefogt did not respond to a phone call for comment on this article.

In spite of the pay increases, the totals for Officer Disbursements were lower in 2011, according to the LM-2, than in the 2010 report. However, total disbursements to employees were up in the 2011 report.

• 2010 - Total Officer Disbursements - $591,654 (w-p-a - $656,694), with deductions subtracted - $489,148;
• 2011 -  Total Officer Disbursements - $517,145 (w-p-a $560,937), with deductions subtracted - $378,745;
• 2010- Total disbursements to employees - $3,154,225 (w-p-a $3,562, 329), with deductions subtracted - $2,409,741;
• 2011 Total disbursements to employees - $3,299,892 (w-p-a $3,670,083), with deductions subtracted - $2,787,916.

In 2001, drug manufacturer Pfizer Inc. was trying to get only the second tax abatement in the city of Ann Arbor’s history and the first since 1982.

Frustrated by the City Council’s tepidness to award the incentives, then-Pfizer Senior Vice President David Canter said the council seemed “anti-business” and implied that the drug manufacturer would completely abandon Ann Arbor if a deal wasn’t forthcoming.

The City Council eventually worked out an $84.2 million tax incentive deal over 20 years. However, just six years later, Pfizer announced it was closing its Ann Arbor facilities by 2008.

Pfizer’s announcement left city officials stunned and media reports followed about the devastating impact the company’s departure would have on the local economy. Pfizer was thought to be a rock of Ann Arbor’s robust economy. It was the city’s largest taxpayer and The city's largest private employer with more than 3,000 workers.

Now, in 2012, Ann Arbor has proven there is life after Pfizer, which raises the question of how important it is to provide big name companies tax incentives in fear of them leaving.

“The big business news rarely translates into significant economic impact,” said James Hohman, a fiscal policy analyst for the Mackinac Center for Public Policy. “The general knee-jerk reaction is, ‘You’ve got to do something for these big businesses.’ But in reality, they don’t account for much. If state policy wants to encourage actual economic growth, then it needs to continue broad-based policy reforms.”

The city of Ann Arbor’s unemployment rate was 5.5 percent in June of 2007 before Pfizer announced it was leaving. By July 2009, the unemployment rate had jumped to 10.3 percent.

“I don't think you can say that the loss was overstated,” said Don Grimes, a University of Michigan economist, in an email. “Pfizer did eliminate 2,000 jobs in Ann Arbor. Add to that the jobs lost as Borders downsized and eventually went into bankruptcy liquidation, the loss of jobs at the Ann Arbor News, the loss of thousands of jobs in auto manufacturing plants (mostly in the eastern part of the county), and even the loss of white collar auto jobs elsewhere in Southeast Michigan, many of whom resided in Ann Arbor, and it’s hard not to conclude that Washtenaw County was hit by a tsunami of job losses.”

By November 2011, Ann Arbor’s unemployment rate had dropped to the 5.5 percent of the Pfizer days. The unemployment rate was 5.9 percent as of January 2012, the most recent data available.

In June 2007, Washtenaw County’s private-sector employment was 127,959. In 2010, it decreased to 112,006. In September 2011, it was up to 120,058, according to the most recent data available. Ann Arbor's overall population has remained virtually unchanged since the 2000 census.

“The interesting question is, ‘Why hasn't [sic] there been bigger negative consequences?’ ” Grimes said. “But, the city of Ann Arbor appears to be thriving.”

Grimes said he thinks the "better educated" residents of Ann Arbor were able to reinvent themselves in new jobs.

“My hunch is that a lot of the former Pfizer workers, Borders workers and white collar auto industry workers made the same sort of transformation. My guess is that the unionized blue collar workers were not as successful in transforming themselves, but that would be the hypothesis to be tested by (a) research project.

“I think Ann Arbor might be a great example of how people successfully adapt to challenge, the eastern part of the county less so I suspect,” Grimes said. “The so-called ‘job security’ of those auto industry union contracts may have allowed the workers to forget their entrepreneurial spirit. If your job/income is not so secure, I think people are always thinking about doing something else and thus when you lose your job/income the person is better prepared (mentally and psychologically) to make the necessary adjustment.”