Local Presidents Got Honest About What's Broken—and What They Need to Lead
Be in the room on February 11 for the next State of Our Union townhall, where the conversation continues: Wednesday, February 11 at 7 p.m. ET.
Whether you're a local president, steward, equity leader, MERC chair, retiree, or a member who's never spoken at a union meeting before—you're invited to log in, listen, and add your voice.
You don't have to commit to supporting Ram to take part; you just have to be willing to talk honestly about what needs to change and what you expect from OPSEU.
State of Our Union Recap # 3 | January 25, 2026
Townhall Recap: January 25
On a Sunday night when 50 centimeters of snow was burying the GTA, local presidents from across Ontario logged in anyway. They shoveled their driveways, charged their devices in case the power went out, and showed up.
Attendees called in from every corner of the province—corrections officers from Thunder Bay, healthcare workers from Hamilton, post secondary staff from Trent, court services from Kingston, developmental services workers, and retirees who've seen OPSEU through decades of change. The room included local presidents, MERC chairs, sector vice-chairs, and even some current EBMs.
Ram opened with a clear acknowledgement: "One of the most disheartening comments I heard in my pre-registration was that this union doesn't stand up for me anymore. No member should feel that way—and we need to change that together."
What followed was nearly two hours of the kind of cross-sector, cross-regional conversation that rarely happens in official OPSEU spaces.
What Members Brought Into the Room
Locals Are Being Set Up to Fail
A president of a 1,200-member local laid out the structural problem bluntly: he merged two locals together just to get a full-time book off position. Even with that, it's more than a full-time job. When he reached out to OPSEU for help with financial assistance, legal guidance, or bylaw approval—he was brushed off for a year, then had his bylaws approved in a single day when someone finally remembered.
"The OPSEU Constitution requires OPSEU to create healthy and sustainable locals," Mark said. "This is not being done."
The numbers back him up. Nearly one in five locals are behind on their TARS. Some have been delinquent for years. And there's no dashboard, no systematic health check, no early intervention—just frustrated presidents trying to keep their locals running on the side of their desk.
Ram committed to pushing for a local health dashboard — a tool that tracks which locals have filled positions, completed educationals, held GMMs, and submitted TARS on time. "If we can see which locals are struggling, we can send in support before they collapse. Right now, we're not even looking."
Staff Reps Are Drowning
The conversation kept circling back to staff rep turnover and workload. One healthcare worker shared that she'd been through five different staff reps in two years—none of whom understood her sector before they were reassigned.
A MERC chair pointed to a gap in health and safety representation where employer-selected workers with no training can override elected union members on advisory committees.
Members want staff reps who know the collective agreement, stay long enough to build relationships, and have manageable caseloads. What they're getting instead is a revolving door that leaves locals abandoned.
Ram didn't sugarcoat it: "We have not done an effort to quantify what a workload for a staff rep should be. Staff reps are telling me they're overworked. There's no proper onboarding, no knowledge transfer when someone leaves. We're setting them up for failure—and then blaming them when locals suffer."
He committed to proper onboarding checklists, knowledge transfer protocols when reps leave, and input from local presidents on staff rep performance — so the people doing the work have a say in whether support is actually landing.
Education Isn't Working
A member with a keen eye for policy flagged a deeper problem: OPSEU passes ambitious resolutions at convention, then lets them die. Mental health leave language was codified in 1987 and still isn't in most collective agreements. A 2023 resolution on building a "state of readiness" for locals hasn't produced anything members can use.
Another member raised how mixed OPS/BPS training classes get derailed because the sectors face different issues. "I have stewards coming back saying they didn't learn anything because it was all BPS issues," she said.
Ram agreed the union's education materials haven't kept pace: "We have members who teach at universities and colleges. Why aren't we using them to develop our curriculum? We used to have partnerships with Mohawk College—we lost them because we didn't keep up."
Ram committed to rebuilding those partnerships and tapping OPSEU's own membership — people who already teach for a living — to modernize the curriculum.
Technology Is Stuck in the 90s
Presidents spoke to lack of ease in doing tasks that should be easier. OPSEU's digital infrastructure is decades behind. Local presidents still receive their member lists quarterly — on PDF. They can't update member contact info from their phones. Presidents with composite locals across multiple worksites have no way to sort or group their members by location. And the weekly OPSEU newsletter? Members say they don't read it because most of it isn't relevant to their sector.
"If you look at a bank where you can update your information or your credit card — millions of users use that system," Ram said. "We can have that. A local president needs to have access to that. These are easy technological solutions that can be implemented."
The tools exist. The investment hasn't. With decades of experience in IT before joining the OPS, Ram sees this as low-hanging fruit: "These are easy fixes that will make people feel engaged. We just haven't prioritized them."
The Board Isn't Strategic
Several members asked about accountability and transparency at the executive level. When four and a half percent was cut from the budget, even some board members couldn't explain what it actually affected.
Ram was direct about what he's seen: "Our board is not strategic. When I sit in on meetings, there's always a 'gotcha' moment, performative debates about resolutions. But there's no dashboard showing the health of our locals. No report card on which policies have actually been implemented. No five-year plan, let alone a ten-year vision."
He contrasted this with his experience on the United Way board, where they planned 2025–2035 strategy back in 2022—and are already building toward 2045.
Ram's governance training — including his ICD.D certification and experience on both OPTrust and United Way boards — is built for exactly this: shifting a board from reactive firefighting to long-term strategy.
What Ram Brought to the Room
Strategic Engagement Over Isolation
When a member asked how he'd work with a government actively attacking workers, Ram didn't retreat to slogans. He drew on his experience as President of the Peel Regional Labour Council—where his region is largely Conservative.
"They show up to my Labour Day events because they see us as vote banks. And that's an opportunity. When I was sitting next to Carolyn Mulroney, I said: if you care about winning after Ford, make sure workers' wages keep up with inflation. She may not agree with me—but that conversation doesn't happen if I refuse to be in the room."
His point wasn't about ideology. It was about power: "If we're not together, we're on the menu. We need to be at the table."
Concrete Solutions, Not Just Critique
Ram didn't just name problems—he offered specifics. On staff rep turnover: proper onboarding checklists, knowledge transfer protocols, input from local presidents on performance. On local health: a dashboard showing which locals have filled positions, completed educationals, held GMMs—so struggling locals get help before they collapse.
On the question of whether OPSEU needs a CEO and CFO separate from elected leadership, Ram pushed back thoughtfully: "If we need that, we already have it in the President and VP offices—they have support staff. The real question is: what reports aren't the board getting? What decisions are being made without proper oversight?"
Solidarity Over Self-Promotion
Ram closed with an unusual move for a candidate. He asked members not to donate to his campaign—and instead to support Local 249 workers, now in their tenth week of strike.
"In good conscience, I cannot ask anybody to donate to my campaign when Local 249 workers are running low on funds for hand warmers. You won't get a t-shirt that says 'Vote for Ram'—because that's secondary. Let's make sure those workers don't cave because they can't afford to be on strike."
He did the math: if just 25% of OPSEU's members donated $10 a week, it would show employers the real power of union solidarity. You can support Local 249 by donating directly here.
Be in the Room Where It Happens
These townhalls are designed as working sessions, not campaign rallies: a place where the reality of OPSEU members—on shop floors, in offices, hospitals, colleges, and community agencies—can directly shape what Ram pushes for at the executive table.
His experience gives him tools, but the point of being in the room together is to turn members' day-to-day frustrations and ideas into concrete priorities on money, services, equity, and strategy.
You don't need a fully formed plan to show up—just a sense of what isn't working and what "showing up" from your union would actually look like in your world.
Each townhall builds on the last, so the more often members come back, the sharper and more grounded that shared agenda becomes.
Be in the room on February 11 for the next State of Our Union town hall! RSVP here:
Whether you're a local president, steward, equity leader, retiree, or a member who has never spoken at a union meeting before—you're invited to log in, listen, and add your voice. You don't have to commit to supporting Ram to take part; you just have to be willing to talk honestly about what needs to change and what you expect from OPSEU.
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Over the next while, ask people in your union one simple question: "What would make you feel like OPSEU really has your back?" Listen and write it down. Bring those answers back—either by joining the next townhall or sharing them with us here.🫱🏿🫲🏻 CONNECT directly. Are you a delegate? Ram wants to hear what matters most to you—not pitch you, but listen. Book a 1-on-1 conversation here. No commitment, no pressure. Just two union members talking about what's possible.
🗣️ SPEAK publicly. If you've seen enough to know Ram represents the kind of leadership OPSEU needs, say so. Your name alongside his tells other members: this is someone worth paying attention to. Add your endorsement at here!
🗓 ACT together, not alone.
Our next State of Our Union calls are open to all OPSEU members—not just delegates and not just people who already support Ram. Register here.So please keep coming to our calls, and invite more people to join. If we want things to be different at OPSEU, we have to try different things—and that is why we're hosting these townhalls.
Invite your coworkers—especially the ones who never come to meetings but have a lot to say on break—or send them the townhall link or the website so they can add their voice.
If you take nothing else from this, let it be this:
You are not imagining the problems you're seeing in OPSEU. They are real, they are structural, and they are shared. But the energy and clarity you brought into that call are also real—and they're exactly what's needed to rebuild something better, across sectors, not in silos.
Thank you for showing up on a snow day and speaking honestly.
In solidarity,
Ram Selvarajah
Candidate for Region 5 EBM and First VP/Treasurer
