August 31, 2010

WSU Bargaining Update

Washington Federation of State Employees • AFSCME Council 28 • AFL-CIO www.wfse.org

Mediation
schedule: MEDIATION SUMMARY - SESSION 2
Mon., August 9 The students have all returned to campus Working conditions we want changed:
Tue., August 31 at Washington State University. They are
TBD attending lectures in classrooms and labs • Holiday pay equivalent to work shift -
repaired by union members, eating food Count “a day as a day” for members who
WSU Bargaining work a 4/10 schedule (four 10-hour days
Team: prepared and served by union members
and using electricity and water provided by per week). Currently 4/10 workers are re-
Curt Bod quired to use two hours of personal leave
infrastructure maintained by union mem-
Brett Clubbe each time they enjoy a holiday with their
bers.
Roger Eberhardt families. That equals 22 hours of person-
Yvonne Kibbee On the last day of August we met for our al leave they must use for holidays each
Eric Needham second mediation session with management. year. We have asked that they receive a
Lance Mitchell full day’s leave for each holiday.
Gerry Stamper Through the mediator, we floated changes
Robert Stilson of language - possibly backing down from • Work during cyclic leave - Guarantee
cost-of-living increases we asked for. additional work that comes up to cyclic
Lead Negotiator: employees on their leave. Students and
Management maintains raises are out temporary workers have been hired for
Phedra Quincey of the question in these tough economic
phedraq@wfse.org staffing events that occur during our
times. All other Federation contracts cur- members’ cyclic leave time. Our mem-
Contact the rently in negotiation do not include cost- bers could use this additional work.
team: of-living raises, nor do those being negoti-
info@wfse.org ated by other unions. • Sick leave as time-worked - Count
Please put “Message
sick leave as time worked for calculat-
Our team agreed to fix contract language ing overtime. Some members have been
for the WSU Bargaining
around work-related phone calls made to forced to work overtime later in a pay
Team” in the subject line.
members’ homes during off-duty hours. period when they took sick leave earlier.
Online at: This issue has been causing problems for
www.wfse.org > many members. Now any work-related • Parking rate freeze - Freeze on-campus
Bargaining Center > phone calls will be counted as ten minutes parking rates for members at 2010 levels
WSU Bargaining time worked. until the end of the contract in July 2013.
Team Info & News
We also agreed to extend language to all • Expand hazard pay - Add additional
Email alerts: bargaining units relating to temporary up- work descriptions to what would receive
Sign-up to receive grades. Now when a member is asked to hazard pay, as per the UW contract.
email and/or text do the work of a supervisor or higher class
worker for more than two weeks they will Some of these proposals first appeared in
message alerts from
receive a greater rate of pay. our 2008 negotiations, but were taken off
the team.
Go to WFSE.org, register the table in exchange for the cost-of-living
as a user and join the WSU Since management maintains money is not raises that the governor initially agreed to
Bargaining Team email available for wage increases, we expressed but then later removed from the budget
group. Provide cell num-
ber and carrier to start a willingness to forgo financial gains if before sending it to the legislature. Many
receiving text alerts. the university would agree to fix language Federation tables included an additional
around working conditions that leads to personal holiday even when the raises were
problems for our members. rescinded. The WSU table did not.
WSU Bargaining Update
FAIR PLAYING FIELDS
Think about two workers doing the
same work on a 4/10 schedule at
two different state-run schools at
either end of the state.
• The 4/10 worker at The Ever-
green State College in Olympia
receives 10 hours of holiday pay
for each of ten statutory holidays
in the contract. So this worker is
receiving full compensation for a
total of 40 hours in each week a
holiday occurs.
• At WSU, the 4/10 worker is
required to kick in two hours of
accrued annual leave for each
statutory holiday. In order to
receive full compensation for the
weeks when holidays occur, the
4/10 worker must either spend
20 hours of their leave - or lose
2 hours of pay; or, if available,
change their schedule to a 5/8
schedule. The holiday benefit
can become a liability for the
4/10 worker at WSU.
Management says they don’t care
what other schools do. They will
run WSU the way they want to.
We say it is not fair that two people
doing the same job should be com-
pensated differently.
It will cost very little financially to
make working conditions better for
bargaining unit employees at WSU
who are suffering disproportion-
ately from the budget cuts, hiring
freezes and health cost increases.
University team leader Richard
Heath said, “Everything costs
money in one form or another. It all
costs money.”
We recognize that this is true but
it must be kept in mind that we have
been asked to do more work with less
resources and support over the past
two years, while our budgets have
been cut and our coworkers let go.
And we have successfully done
more with less and are now being
asked to sacrifice even more. The
University claims poverty around
the negotiation table one day, and
the next day lands a $218 million
(a 40% increase) in outside funding
they received in 2009/2010.
(WSU, Wednesday, September 1, 2010) http://www.
wsutoday.wsu.edu/pages/publications.asp?Action=D
etail&PublicationID=21271&TypeID=1
Where is the concern for the em-
ployees who make their organiza-
tion run?
When the students returned to
campus in August, everything was
how and where it should be, thanks
to the dedicated workers who take
pride in making the campus a safe
and friendly learning environment
for the nation’s future leaders.
It’s time for WSU to show us that
our sacrifices have been appreci-
ated and that some funds will be
found to help improve the condi-
tions of our labor at WSU.
It is within the spirit of cooperation
that we call on WSU to work with
us so that we will all be able to get
through these tough times together.
We can finish this contract and
meet the Oct. 1 deadline to have
the funding included in the gov-
ernor’s budget if the University is
willing to give us a few working
condition improvements to help
offset the take backs of past years.
The next mediation date is Sept. 20.