These are our stories - meant for a deeper understanding of how the recent restructuring of the SAG-AFTRA Health Plan is impacting our lives.

Please send your story and high resolution head-shot and/or a landscape filmed 59 second video telling your story to HealthCareConcerns2020@gmail.com

Parker Stevenson

I have paid in earnings contributions for 54 years, while I have had virtually no medical expenses. Now that I am officially a senior and someday might truly need the protection that I have paid for from our Medical Insurance Program, my Parent Union of five decades drops me from my earned coverages because of egregious and potentially illegal mismanagement of our medical Insurance program, and all during the Covid pandemic that has halted production for most of this year. How telling that the impending collapse of our Medical Insurance program was not front and center during our recent Union election of Officers.

I am outraged but more importantly so deeply saddened by this gross betrayal of the Guild Union that is entrusted with protecting all of its' members.

On a practical level I have been met with constant delays, gaps in information, or worse false information from the several video Seminars I participated in, or in my countless calls to the SAG-AFTRA Health Plan Offices, which has only made it all the more difficult to secure replacement insurance coverages.

It is now clear that Insurance coverages for my wife and myself have now gone from $1,400/year to $6,987/year even after the $1,140 HRA Reimbursement.

Finally, the SAG-AFTRA December 4th mass E-mail defending their current actions, in no way addressed my experience, my situation, or my multi decades long contributions into the SAG health Plan. Simply put, this is a shameful and insulting betrayal.

Janie Tutelman-Spielberg

I am not an actor. But I was happily married to one; we were together for 25 years. David was a proud SAG member for decades prior to his death in 2016 at age 77. He was a Senior Performer, Plan 1, and always wore his SAG pin proudly. He loved his Union. I still receive residuals from work he did many years ago, and I receive a few pension dollars each month which could cover the cost of a meal. That doesn’t matter. We had a good life and no health care worries because the Union provided health coverage out of his earnings. His EARNINGS. He earned his Plan 1 health coverage many times over and loved the work he did to receive it. Prior to his death David was hospitalized, tested, sent to rehab and finally, home to hospice. Most of our expenses were covered by Medicare and secondarily by SAG health plan. Each year since then I signed a form stating I have not remarried, and the Health Plan continued in effect for another year. No worries.
Imagine my shock to receive notification that the last day of health coverage would be the last day of 2020. The notice was confusing, or maybe I was simply in denial. I called the phone number to address the confusion, and the person on the other end of the line sounded surprisingly like a salesman. That’s because he was. “This is a GOOD thing” he repeated several times. How can losing health coverage at age 74, in the middle of a world-wide pandemic, be a good thing? My husband always supported his Union, who in the end, betrayed him. I’m still here to be proud of all of his work. In a way I’m glad David did not live to experience this betrayal and I wonder who will lose their health care next.

David Lander, Kathy Fields Lander, Natalie Lander and son-in-law Jared Hillman.

We’re Union Members since the 1960s. David has always managed to be on plan one. He is Squiggy on Laverne and Shirley and has more than 45 years+ credits - now disabled and wheelchair-bound with MS. One thing we have always been grateful for was our health plan and pension. Our Daughter is Natalie Lander and our son-in-law is Jared Hillman. All four of us are SAG members. Natalie is 3rd generation; I am second generation. We have a long family history with SAG. And you know David's work. He kept going even after his diagnosis in spite of industry discrimination of those with disabilities. Never did I think this would happen. The older actors built this union. When I came in there weren't even residuals back then. We've been long standing the Union members , including AFTRA and Writer's guild and Equity and Local 659. Card-carrying members in multiple unions. But SAG is our parent union, and no-one should be abandoned by their parent. What worries me is that everyone now will be forced onto an Advantage Plan, the privatization of Medicare. I have been working on the Board of CaliforniaOneCare's campaign for Single-Payer Health care since it's inception 15 years ago on Sheila Kuehl's bill.

Deborah White

My name is Deborah White and I have been a member of SAG since 1965. I am retired, but I maintain my SAG insurance as my primary because I work on occasion.

About twenty years ago, I realized that older white women were in abundance while the roles for them were disappearing. So I took my pension early and went back to school. Now I am an adjunct college professor.

I love teaching. But part-time adjunct professors at New York City colleges do not qualify for adequate healthcare. I have always paid hefty SAG dues, as well as monthly premiums and deductibles, with the understanding that I was contributing to my ongoing health care. I believed my SAG work and residuals would continue to support my low-paying "teaching habit" for as long as I wanted. Apparently, extremely bad and questionable management at SAG has stolen my dream.

I am deeply disappointed, dispirited, heartbroken and angry that SAG has pulled the rug from under its senior performers. My residuals ARE my work. Certainly there will be some major healthcare issues coming around the corner. Right now is when the payoff for my union loyalty, and for not going Fi-Core, would have kicked in. Apparently I was a fool to think that SAG had a vested interest in senior performers welfare.  

         So...let's get real...Where did the money really go?!

Anthony Marciona

I have been a professional Actor/Performing Artist since I was five. As an over 50-year member of SAG-AFTRA and AEA, I have only know Union Work. I was always proud to be part of such a prestigious Membership, and appreciative of the benefits and wages that a Union stands for and supports. I have always counted on the protection of my Union and the promise of a pension and healthcare in my later years.  Then, the Union dropped all its members a bomb!  Over 8,000 seniors + their dependents , as well as a huge percentage of the membership who haven’t been working and may continue to be unemployed because of this pandemic. 

 Now, with a retired husband with a chronic disability, I find myself in a precarious situation. We are no strangers to being at Healthcare Plan Trustees whims.  My husband had 5 surgeries and then was dropped for having a “pre-existing condition”. Later, he was finally able to be covered  through my SAG plan as my domestic partner. Then dropped again, when same-sex marriage became legal, because we were not yet married.  Finally, we were both covered, after just meeting the continually rising minimums for the SAG-AFTRA Healthcare plan.  This year, I do not anticipate making my minimum earnings, with the pandemic keeping all of us out of work.  I am dreading January 1st, when we will be without healthcare.  It makes me so depressed to see so many of my friends and senior members in the same or worse predicaments. How could our own Union betray us? 

However, like any large entity, corruption and mismanagement exists and persists.  This will continue unless we wake up and fight for what the founders of our Unions initially risked their careers for. As I have aged, I have become very active and vocal with the Union, and experienced benefits and wages disappearing. We must educate ourselves, stay informed, be active and support ALL our members. We are all in this together and must continue, in solidarity, to keep our Union supportive, working for us, involved and relevant into the future.

Harry Johnson 

I’ve been a SAG member for 44 years. I am collecting my pension. I’ve been bragging for years how lucky I was to belong to a union with a great health plan. My wife of 11 years is also covered under our plan. Now, that if very likely to be taken away from us just when we are likely to need health care the most. I still earn a decent living from residuals. The producers contribute to our health plan based on our income, which is 80% residuals. Yet, this income is not being counted as an eligibility factor in my qualification for our ‘new’ health plan. This seems entirely wrong.

One more thing, David White is our chief negotiator for our contracts and also a trustee for the health plan. He negotiated our most recent contract with the producers, knowing the health plan was about to change drastically. This seems not just wrong, but criminally fraudulent.

Kevin McCorkle

Last night Friday August 21, I attended the second of an ongoing series of Town Hall Meetings to discuss the real-life effects if the “restructuring” of the SAG-AFTRA healthcare plan. It felt like what a Union Hall meeting should be. Attended by Four Hundred and fifty plus people . . . members communicating with other members, telling their stories, sharing their experiences, bonding together seeking answers and solutions to something that is happening that will tangibly affect their lives and the lives of their family members.

There was a mix of high-profile “name” actors, blue collar working actors; “I remember her from that series.” “Wasn’t he great in that film?” to young people just starting out. There was one couple on with their 2 little dogs that broke my heart. Actors weren’t the only attendees; dancers, singers, stunt performers, spouses of deceased performers, reporters, union political leaders, there was even a rumor that Michael Estrada CEO of our Health Plan was attending for a while.

Of course, there were a few ZOOM Bombers trying to shock the group with photos and videos of porn and explicit videos. Don’t they know that we are a bunch of Actors and not much they can do will shock us? I feel pity for them and their need for attention. Then there were the chat bombers who for some reason just love the n-word God bless them and their lost souls, what a waste of life.

David White and Carol Lombardini had a chance to be heroes in the last contract negotiations. As lead negotiators for SAG-AFTRA and the AMPTP as well as Trustees of the health plan they both had the knowledge and more importantly the tools to make this drastic restructuring of the health plan go a different way. If David had encouraged our team to have given the National Board the power to divert our entire 3% cost of living increase to the health plan if needed because of the two looming crises; the depletion of the Healthcare reserves and the CoVid pandemic, I think the membership would have gone for it. That would be the SAG-AFTRA give.

The give on the producers’ side would have been to raise the producers’ CAPs on all platforms by 9% which would have them paying them at 1985 rates rather than 1982 rates. They could have moved the two teams of Trustees toward a heroic solution that would have made everyone happy and whole. That is fulfilling fiduciary responsibility to protect the fund as it is and take care of it and the people it is bound to protect. Protect those that have also contributed to it for decades.

Instead the lead negotiators for our contracts Members of the Board of Trustees for our plan and David (SAGAFTRA) and Carol (AMPTP) chose to follow the route of “negotiations as usual” in the middle of a pandemic with no one working. No raise in producers’ CAPs and a small percentage diversion option is what we got instead. We, and when I say we, I mean every participant that will be adversely affected by this restructuring and those that fight for and with us (although there will be some that will paint this as a political battle, power grab, conspiracy theory etc. etc. etc.) …….we may not win this, we may not overturn this change.

If we do it will require a herculean effort on both the SAG-AFTRA team and the AMPTP team to then miraculously come together and do what it takes to save the plan. That will be historic and unprecedented taking effort, planning and a willingness to do the right thing. I lived through a 20% survival diagnosis when I had Cancer in 2013. I am one of the group of people they so casually reference in the SAG-AFTRA Healthcare Webinars. One of the people that would likely be dead but for the insurance SAG-AFTRA provides.

Because I survived, I feel the need to put as much energy, creativity, work and time to save this plan as it is rather than “restructuring” it for convenience and “economic efficiency”. There are thousands that feel the same way. Let’s use the energy and power we have in a calm, focused, determined and tenacious way to save the lives of those that will be lost if these changes stand and are enforced on January 1, 2021. The clock is ticking but it hasn’t run out. It is never the wrong time to do the right thing.

Neal Kaz

I have been a very proud member of SAG and Aftra since 1972.  I’m collecting small pensions from SAG and Aftra and Social Security and residual checks.  This drastic cruel change to the SAG AFTRA Health Plan for seniors and spouses at a time when we are dealing with a once in a lifetime pandemic, is unconscionable.

I am on a fixed income and my wife of 29 years lost her job on March 20 due to COVID.  I am very proud of my profession of almost 50 years. I worked hard to make sure that in my retirement I would have health insurance for myself and my wife and that we would not worry about affordable health care.  My work over the years ensured that other actors were supported and I always thought our union would be there for my family and I as I was for them.

As a young union actor , I appreciated that it was a “one for all and all for one “ motto and we as members would make sure that the elder long term members would be taken care of in their lean years.  I am dumbfounded that the people in control of our union would allow this travesty to happen.   Has there been no oversight or diligence to reserve for downturns and health care increases?  I am afraid that my wife and I may not be able to afford the medical and dental coverage we have qualified for and have relied upon to protect us in our retirement years.  I am very worried about our future and how the guild can use the senior health plan as the sacrificial lamb when it is our work over the last 50 years that has kept this union afloat!

I’ve never worked non-union since becoming a member of SAG and have never worked in any other profession since 1978.  We have been put in a perilous financial position at a time when there are no jobs and a virus preventing work from going on in a normal fashion. 

Thank you for your attention and let me know what we can do to help do something to change this horrible situation.

Erin Connolly

With these new changes, my SAG-AFTRA quarterly premiums will go from $375 to $745 and my husband will no longer be covered. This is going to have a large impact on my family and many families across the country. We must work together to overturn these changes immediately.

Evening News Anchor

WFSB – Channel 3 Eyewitness News

Hillary B. Smith

When Sag and Aftra merged their health plans in 2016, the SAG-AFTRA Health Plan discontinued the “Early Retirement Program” for members over 55 years of age that had age and service. Those of us who had retired with the promise of healthcare for the rest of our lives (I was specifically told this by a healthcare representative from the then AFTRA Health Plan), we were suddenly informed that we now had to qualify again for coverage. We were told in June when most of the industry was on hiatus. We had 15 weeks to qualify before the January 1, 2017 deadline. I had been out of the workforce for two years. My husband has a heart condition and was seeing a specialist in Boston who also treated my daughter. When I called the union, they suggested that I go on Obamacare. This was just before the elections when one of the candidates, Donald Trump, had vowed to dismantle Obamacare. We had to go to the marketplace to find healthcare which resulted in my husband having to leave his specialist and find a new one in another state. I wrote to every trustee on the Health Plan and on the union board. I heard back from three people. Two Trustees were furious that it had happened and they had tried to get the plan to Grandfather those already retired. They felt that the administrators were making the decisions without the full board approval. I asked, “Doesn’t the administrators work for us?” I was also told that I wasn’t the only one who had been writing and calling about this injustice. I consulted a lawyer who agreed that there was age discrimination there, but a class action suit was the best way to approach this. I wrote to actors on Facebook and Instagram trying to rally people, to no avail. The union has been undercutting the people over 55 for years. It is appalling! And it will continue as long as they can get away with it.

I have had to go back to work creating work for myself in order to make my healthcare coverage. With this new increase and the shut down, there is no way that I can make it. I would like to know why the union always announces these changes in the summer when people are on hiatus and have very little time to make up the difference in earnings. Even worse, this time was during a global pandemic when we all need our healthcare more than ever and right after negotiations had been closed, when maybe we could have altered the pay in to the plan.

Pat Lenz

Few things in life thrilled me more than the day I got my SAG card in 1981 for appearing on Happy Days. Ironic, hunh? I've qualified for Healthcare for most of those years and for tier one for most of those. Just within the last 2 years have I had to rely on residuals to get me from tier 2 to tier 1. 
I watched in 2015 as many of my fellow members and friends were screwed after being promised for years that their healthcare would always be there for them. Now it's my turn. I took my pension at 65 two years ago, still making enough to have good low cost healthcare. Now this! My residuals on work I've performed for 39 years no longer counts toward my health care eligibility? Even though it still counts toward my dues status?  Even though the producers of the shows and films in which I performed still make money AND pay into the healthcare system on my behalf? And, the monies they pay in will go to give care and benefits to my younger colleagues and those who are lucky enough to still be making the minimum? AND, doing all of this while the industry is all but shut down because of a pandemic?It's nothing but disgusting and blatant age discrimination.I am grateful that during my eligible years when I had some difficult health issues (breast cancer and several surgeries), and when my husband Tony Pope, also a member, died  on the operating table from heart surgery, we were covered. We would have been in debt up to our collective eyebrows for years if not for our EARNED eligibility in the SAG health plan.But, now I've reached the point where work has fallen off and though I haven't had to rely solely on session work to cover what will inevitably come with my age, I now do.I don't want this to turn into an all out war politically, but if this is allowed to stand then we have to vote out those responsible for not negotiating in good faith to get us the raises in contributions from the producers to shore up the obviously flagging plan. My hope remains the trustees will regain their humanity and sanity and fix this debacle.They were 'Happy Days' for many years.

Warren and Denise Eckstein

My husband Warren Eckstein has been an AFTRA member since the early 80's, and qualified every year since, into the SAG merger.  He is 71, has pre-existing conditions and has postponed cancer surgery due to Covid,  I have had to hide my fear of what being dumped from insurance in just 4 months means & keep from urging him to do the surgery soon, because he doesn't need that pressure.  I have never had to research supplemental Medicare, but it sounds as though coverage for Specialists is iffy and that terrifies me.  He also needs an injectable for rheumatoid arthritis that is covered now under a co-pay program at maybe $10/month, but once we have to purchase Medicare Part D, it will be at least $2700 for the first three months and $500 ongoing monthly.  Add to that: Dental and Mental Health coverage -- we didn't budget for this! 

I was touched by the young performers caring for us, feeling the injustice.  They too have frightening scenarios to confront, with young families.

Denise Eckstein

Heather Eger

My name is Heather Eger SAG-AFTRA member since 2009. 2020 has brought many bad surprises. When I learned I was losing my Health Plan, that was not expected! How could the plan raise days and earnings during a global pandemic!?! These changes are horrific and dangerous, for some deadly.

Getting rid of the senior plan is a slap in the face to those members who made this union what it is. And don’t let me forget getting rid of spouses and children. Why couldn’t they come up with a better plan, a plan to help members not hurt them. I am part of the vulnerable group affected by this. I’m so disappointed in the people involved in making this poor decision. I will be making my voice heard with my VOTE in 2021!

Tony Amendola

I have no argument for the necessity of the changes —proof is in the numbers.But the mishandling of this just leaves me speechless. To create such  division between  older and younger guild members —counting residuals for one group while discounting them for another  based on AGE  is bad enough but then to initiate health eligibility changes RETROACTIVELY is beyond the pale and a
sure path to fracturing SAG/AFTRA. Proud Union member? Sorry to say not today.

Debbie Zipp

Warning: This is long and very blunt.

I was deeply disheartened to hear about the recent changes SAG/AFTRA has made to their Health Care Plan for its members. It opened a somewhat healed wound that the same administration inflicted on at least 300 Retirees & those receiving the Senior Plan in 2015. It was devastating and what happened in 2015 is happening again. It reeks of SAG/AFTRA’s pathological lack of care in how they treat their longtime loyal supportive members, a disregard and utter lack of respect for their rights and the promises made to its members, a severe lack of transparency and, last but not least, blatant Ageism. That is my opinion from what happened in 2015 and what is happening now.

I’m no longer affected because when I turned 65 3 years ago, I did not opt for the Medicare SAG Senior Medigap plan because I could not forgive them for what they did to me and so many others and I also knew that it would happen again and I could not ever trust SAG. Harsh words, I know but I walked away from their plan. We lost the fight in 2015 that lasted over a year but I’m here to tell you that you have to fight and continue to fight no matter what the outcome because the powers that be at SAG/AFTRA have to be held accountable.

Membership First Board Members are the ones who fought for us in 2015 and they are fighting for you now. They called to task SAG/AFTRA’s incredible lack of transparency when making decisions that hurt us middle class actors. Hurting the core of the membership is hurting the whole of SAG Membership. Their actions back then and now have devastating effects on the most supportive membership of SAG/AFTRA that ruin the entire premise behind a Union…to protect its membership. When members like me have lost trust in their Union and the numbers of members who don’t trust their union to protect and stand up for them keep rising, then the Union will be lost for future generations. I do not make these statements lightly. And I don’t see myself as turning on the Union because of these statements.

In 2015, I was a 20-year Vested member of SAG for 42 years who made my living and helped support my family for over 35 years. And when I needed them and my Health Care the most, how did they reward me? They kicked me and many others to the curb. They broke a contract which they said wasn’t a contract but an agreement and penalized my pension.

Fighting back against the Administration and the Board of Trustees of SAG/AFTRA does not mean you are a traitor or unpatriotic to your Union. Quite the opposite, it means you are loyal to the original mission of the Union and care, not just for yourself but for the whole of the Union membership and want to restore its integrity.

Your voices need to be heard and given credence. Questions and investigations need to occur. Did the Board of Trustees look into other options? How did the deficit that led to this decision occur? How long did they see it coming? It must have started before 2015? Who’s responsible? Are the funds and the investments being handled wisely? Why can’t there be sacrifices in other areas? Like, David White’s outrageous salary and other’s 6 figure salaries. Can celebrities that have an excess of money help? There are so many questions that need to be answered and options that need to be investigated and they need to be open and transparent with that.

In 2015, questions like those were posed but largely not answered and there was no forensic accountant hired and no investigation occurred. The petition in 2015 was totally ignored. Can you imagine the AFL-CIO taking away its members access to Health Care or raising the requirement of income to qualify so high that few can meet it, especially during a Pandemic? Can you imagine powerful Unions ignoring their members petitions or questions? Can you imagine a Union like the AFL-CIO eliminating a Health Care Plan for it's Seniors, the most vulnerable members? Can you imagine them sending an impersonal form letter with such bad news to its members? I can’t. They would not disrespect or humiliate their members like that. But I received a letter like that from SAG/AFTRA in 2015 just before Thanksgiving, giving very little notice before we had to find coverage elsewhere. The first place to start is the Petition so I’m suggesting every member sign it.

Positive changes need to be made to protect the Union membership from the bad decision made for you and future members in the years to come. So please, sign the petition and keep fighting for your rights and a better Union.

Wishing you all the best of luck.

Becky Stockton

My name is Becky Stockton and I've been a loyal member of SAG-AFTRA for over 16yrs. I represent a group of hardworking professional actors who need Plan II when we don't have the earnings for Plan I. We are commercial actors, voice-over actors, stunt performers, stand-ins, background performers, & more. I have accumulated more overtime than most Americans, I work more than most of my peers, I've never been late on a payment to the union or health plan, and I've always been the first to be vocal & active in upholding our contracts with the producers. Now the trustees are throwing us under the bus. Loyal members are being dropped from our healthcare during the worst health crisis of our lifetime. Many of us have pre-existing conditions and the trustees betrayal is causing us irreparable harm. Instead of protecting us, our trustees are harming working families. I'm losing the lifetime insurance I've been promised and working so hard for. Now myself, and thousands like me, are scrambling to make enough hours to qualify for heath care during a time when most of our industry is shut down. Our retired seniors are scrambling to supplement their healthcare when they've spent their entire lives & professional careers earning the right to it. SAG was created to protect our most vulnerable performing artists who were often taken advantage of by the wealthy people running the business. The trustees (many of whom are producers and lawyers who make more than the majority of us) have turned their backs on our most vulnerable members. The trustees blame the pandemic, but their mismanagement of our health plan was going on years before COVID ever happened. This is an outrage. It's time to replace the trustees, & protect our people. 

Cindy Novak-Naia 

I have had sag healthcare for at least four years. My children are on it and so is my husband who happens to have a medical condition ,pancreatitis, and relies on this insurance to help pay for hospital bills and medication he takes every day.!

Now sag is changing everything on all of us and it's not fair! because of the coronavirus we get punished!

 My cut off time to make the insurance guidelines was Sept. 30th and I had to make 83 days or 18,000 dollars or something like that. Now they changed it to 100 days or 25,000 dollars. and since they just started slowly opening a few jobs there is no way to meet those requirements so why do I have to "pay the price " of losing insurance for something that wasn't my fault..the coronavirus! 

Then they totally change the insurance we have so this new insurance (if you get it by meeting the new requirements) and it's more money per month , higher deductibles and what if you have to change doctors?? How does my husband deal with that?  This is wrong ! Sag shouldn't be allowed to change anything in the middle of a pandemic and I know I'm not the only one who feels this way.

I feel I will not be able to get any of the new insurance.

Steven M. Porter

I have been an active Union member since 1981, I have almost 30 years vested.
Each year I pay very close attention to my earning and how much I need to qualify for Health Insurance.
My base period is from October to October.
This year I was very happy to see I had earned the $18,000 to qualify by the end of the third quarter of my base period.
I found out recently as did you all. The trustees moved the goalposts.
I no longer qualified for Health Insurance through no fault of my own.
There is no way I can earn another $8,000 in the month and a half I have before October 1.
Especially during a Pandemic.
My Health Care and Insurance was ripped out of my hands and that is wrong.
This is heartless and unconscionable.
And something must be done to right this wrong.