Rest in Power, Ben Conant, Ted Rippy and Brett Hoskins

MSEA-SEIU Retirees Steering Committee Member Ben Conant, the recipient of our 2022 MSEA-SEIU Lifetime Achievement Award, died Nov. 22, 2022. A longtime leader in our union who organized our retirees’ raffle at Annual Meeting, Ben worked nearly 50 years in law enforcement for the State of Maine and Oxford County.

Ted Rippy, a fierce advocate for home-care services for all Maine people, died in December 2022. He was a leader in our Local 771 Chapter (named for the starting hourly wage of $7.71 for personal assistants at the time of the chapter’s founding) from 2010 to 2012 and a longtime board member at Food AND Medicine.

Retiree Member Brett Hoskins worked for over 20 years for MainePERS and previously represented us as Labor Co-Chair of the State Employee Health Commission. He advocated for quality, affordable healthcare and prescription coverage for participants in the State Employee Health Plan. He died Jan. 20, 2023.