CUE met with the University on May 18 & 19, 2000. The University had
no counter proposal to CUE's comprehensive wage proposal offered last
week. When pressed by CUE, UC indicated that no proposal would be
forthcoming immediately as they are evaluating developments in
Sacramento. Sharon Hayden, UC's Chief Negotiator, noted the
multimillion-dollar increase
in the governor's budget proposal, but was unprepared to translate
that into a clerical wage offer. At present, UC has more than $1.9
billion in unrestricted reserves. CUE believes that UC could fund
our very reasonable wage demands -- no matter what is allocated by
the state of California.
In light of the University's refusal to bargain wages, CUE pressed
negotiation of non-economic issues. As a result, CUE and the
University signed a Tentative Agreement on Performance Evaluations.
Among other gains, this article now requires that anyone who is to
receive an unsatisfactory evaluation will be alerted ahead of time
and will be
informed what is necessary to be considered satisfactory; in
addition, this article requires the University to provide advance
notice to CUE before a significant proposed change in performance
evaluation forms or performance standards. This agreement also
requires UC to enter into discussions with CUE before implementing
any significant change in performance evaluation forms or performance
standards. When a final contract is approved, this language on
performance evaluations will break important new ground for clerical
workers in this area.
The University seemed unconcerned about securing future dates for
further negotiations because of their unwillingness to present a
counter offer on wages. CUE stressed that there are still many
critically important non-economic issues between us that need
resolution. Among these are Nondiscrimination, Violence in the
Workplace, and Work Rules -- on which the University has made no
movement. We meet again June 1 and 2, 2000.
CUE's Bargaining Team:
- Christine Benoit (Riverside)
- Debbie Ceder (Santa Barbara)
- Mark Covington (Lawrence Berkeley National Lab)
- Jennifer Goodheart (Santa Cruz)
- LeAnn Herigstad (Davis)
- Alyce Herrera (Lawrence Berkeley National Lab)
- Lyn Kelly (Los Angeles)
- Robin Luczak (San Diego)
- Joanne Murray (Santa Barbara)
- Cynthia Norman (Irvine)
- Margy Wilkinson (Berkeley)
- Mark Blum (Chief Negotiator)
