UC - AFT NEWS

• UC-AFT Officer Candidate statements
• UCB Extension English Language Program to close
• Lecturers Bargaining archives
• UC Administrators' Compensation Packages
• Spring, 2004 UC-AFT Perspective (1 MB pdf)
• Roddy and Klar meet with Dynes

Since the end of the 2001-02 academic year, bargaining between Unit 18, representing the lecturers at UC, and the administration, has been slow to say the least. We continue to face a bargaining team on the other side that has no real authority to respond in a serious way to our proposals on the most important issues to our members. On a couple of our most important issues, salaries and protections for pre-six-year lecturers, the administration has signaled its absolute refusal to negotiate any further. That leaves pre-six lecturers without any kind of protection in the Memorandum of Understanding and an insulting salary offer of slightly more than 1% a year for the last three years. The UC-AFT bargaining team was only able to keep the administration team at the table at all by agreeing, for the time being, to move on to other topics on which we may still be able to make at least some progress. We remain concerned that more often than not, the administration team appears to be unable to say either yes or no to our proposals, or actually commit to the concepts in which they express interest at the table.

It is clear, with respect to the central issues of pre-six appointments and salaries, that without outside pressure from the Legislature, and/or direct member action on the campuses, we will make no progress at the bargaining table. On the other major outstanding issues, we have been having mediated discussions under the supervision of Marty Morgenstern, the Governor's chief advisor on labor issues.

In May, the administration had cancelled several days of bargaining, saying that they wanted to present us with a comprehensive proposal, one that would represent major shifts in their intractable positions on many articles of the contract. The proposal that they offered on May 23rd had few changes, was not new, and was no more acceptable, therefore, than earlier ones had been.

At that point, the UC-AFT proposed that the parties seek mediation help from the Governor's office and it was then that Mr.Morgenstern stepped in. In June and early July, we met a number of times in Sacramento and Oakland for mediated discussions. Although the administration continued at the table to insist that they were very interested in wrapping up the lecturers' contract, we received very little in the way of actual proposals on the major issues. Even on the minor ones, the Union's most reasonable proposals to resolve differences were met with verbal agreement at the table, which the administration team was unable or unwilling to consummate in terms of formal written proposals. The University administration's lobbyist in Sacramento represented this to legislators and the media as "being close to settlement on the Lecturers' Contract."

In late June and early July under Mr. Morgenstern's direction, the parties undertook more serious discussions of the contract protections for post-six-year lecturers (Appointments, Layoff, and Discipline and Dismissal). Once again, we had discussions that seemed promising in terms of creating a new system of continuing appointments that would actually guarantee lecturers some security so long as their courses continue to be taught and they continue to teach to the expected standard. The administration team appeared to be willing to consider closing some of the loopholes in their May Comprehensive Proposal which had rendered the abstract promise of "continuing lecturer" status an empty promise.

We also held serious discussions about solutions to the workload problems being experienced by many of our members. The Union team made a number of significant concessions which would allow the expanded use of graduate students and distinguished visiting professors in limited and carefully considered situations. However, once again, in a classic example of bad-faith bargaining, the administration team was unable to deliver written proposals reflecting the progress we believed we were making verbally at the table.

During part of July, Mr. Morgenstern was out of the country and he was able to arrange for a temporary mediator to replace him. Discussions which had moments of promise, but which were never consummated in written proposals, continued over a span of several meetings in Oakland.

Finally, when Marty Morgernstern returned in late July, the parties met again with both mediators in Sacramento and, under pressure from Mr. Morgenstern to produce "actual contract language to pass across the table," the administration presented the Union with a new set of proposals on most of the major issues except salaries and pre-six appointments. The new proposals from the administration do include some movement in a number of areas, but they still fall far short of providing an even minimally acceptable contract to present to our members.

However, attempting to follow the suggestions of Mediator Morgenstern, the UC-AFT bargaining team has almost completed the process of drafting a comprehensive proposal on every outstanding Article in the Memorandum of Understanding. We are making significant movement in a number of areas, and trying to wrap up a host of minor issues, but we continue to insist upon a contract that recognizes the significant contribution that our members make to the teaching mission of the University. We must have a contract that delivers enforceability, meaningful improvements in job security, decent salaries, professional development, and reasonable workload protection.

Those of us on the Unit 18 bargaining team understand that our members' frustration is reaching new heights (as expressed in the recent strike authorization vote in which 88% of the members voting supported job actions). We also can see that there are certain improvements in the contract that we cannot win at the table absent significant outside pressure. But we are prepared to continue working on the Articles we can resolve and pressing for the movement necessary to complete this bargaining as soon as possible. With your help we will make it happen.

UC-AFT Bargaining Team