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THE NEXT-TO-LAST ONE!
by Bert Thomas, UCLA Representative, CUE BARGAINING TEAM
(A personal diary, not the Official Report)
ONE OF THESE HEADLINES IS NOT LIKE THE OTHERS:
Hard to choose, ain't it? They're all unthinkable. But you're right if you guessed that only the first one is true. So far.
CUE workers will get about 12% across the three years ending June 30, 2008. And for the first time, Library Assistants are being granted equity increases to begin to bring them up to the same level of poverty the rest of us enjoy. Whoopee.
Not a very satisfying money contract--we started out asking for 21%--but it could have been a damn sight worse. When AFSCME settled for the "Governor's Compact" 12%, it became a template for everyone else. The University kept asking "Why should CUE workers get more than AFSCME workers? That would be inequity." Try to forget, won't you, that President Dynes said the Governor's Compact was "the floor, not the ceiling"? Turns out that was, um...wrong. It walked like a duck, quacked like a duck...maybe it was just a lying duck.
PATIENCE, VIGILANCE, JUSTICE AT LAST
The Press has finally noticed. The mighty UC is finally taking body blows from the Legislature and the public, outraged at the avarice and gluttony of "executives" whose self-importance and arrogance have long outpaced their actual usefulness to what used to be a "public" University.
The Dynes administration and Regents are finally exposed. Back-pedaling now at warp speed, they're telling everybody that their executive compensation practices will be audited (albeit, by their own "outside" auditor)...and the State Legislature, smelling an opportunity to assert itself at last, is screaming for blood. UC's Provost, M.R.C. Greenwood, briefly #2 in the food chain, resigned in disgrace after only a few months on the job, soon to be RE-HIRED at UC Davis...my, my. The San Francisco Chronicle reports that another executive at UC Davis got $205,000 a year to do nothing at all...that senior UC officials received $871 million in "hidden" compensation (Gee whillikers, Batman, almost a $BILLION?)...while the noble University cried poverty from its various official blowholes.
Who ARE these ridiculous people? My god, they're superior, ain't they? Worth every million to "recruit and retain."
The Dynes administration now has no credibility. Even the Regents are on the rug. Bizarre perquisites, cronyism, a clubby kind of corporate "mercy" that grants fabulous payouts even to those caught in the act of fraud and embezzlement. Why, it's breathtaking. And embarrassing to work here.
And lest he dodge every bullet, let's not forget to mention a fella who deserves a lot of the credit for trashing the University's ethics, financial reputation, and employee relations: Ladies & Gents, I give you (I wish I could) the fabulous Senior VP of Finance: Joe Mullinix! Gee, fingerprints on everything and not even a frame of guilty-face on the teevee. With everybody else issuing denials, Joe's just toughing it out in a secure, undisclosed location. Come on out, Joe, wherever you are! Maximum Bob and Judy Boyette really need your help, dude...to spread the hustle and thin the spin.
CUE: GUILTY AS CHARGED
You did all this, CUE-balls. You and your union were responsible for the research into UC's finances and passing it on to the media, other unions, and co-workers for about 4 years now. We all stand on the shoulders and bones of activists who came before us, and only your continued courage and laughter enabled us to prevail against a foe so huge and humorless. "Seriousness is the only refuge of the shallow," said Oscar Wilde. And UC's management folk are serious as a heart attack.
THE "WOMEN'S CAUCUS"...A BACK-STORY YOU SHOULD KNOW
Late in the night of December 14th going into Thursday, the morning of the 15th, the teams and the Mediator, Paul Roose, were heading surely in the direction of "Tentative Agreement" when it all went to hell.
UC Negotiator Peter Chester and his boss, Howard Pripas (who'd come to help out), suddenly withdrew or withheld their approval of the Mediator's proposal for settlement of the famous "Bogus Days" (Holiday Curtailment) issue. Mind, they'd seen the thing through four previous drafts of the Mediator's proposal without so much as a whisper of complaint...but now they had a problem with it.
In CUE's late-night caucus, the team was furious and depressed. Our Chief Negotiator, Amatullah Alaji-Sabrie, stepped outside the room long enough to spy the women on UC's team (Lynn Thompson of UCLA, Susan Wright of San Francisco, Patty Donnelly of UCOP, and Shada Kuba of the Berkeley Lab) all sitting alone in wonderment and boredom, while "the boys" (Peter Chester and Howard Pripas) huddled together over a hot computer doing manly work, presumably.
Amatullah returned to our room and proposed--out of sheer desperation, she admitted--a "Women's Caucus", a meeting of females from their team and ours, downstairs, away from the mediation rooms and "the boys". And lo, the UC women agreed to attend.
At length, and with the full knowledge of the Mediator and all us fellas, Amatullah and Lynn Thompson were trading ideas back and forth between their respective teams from the hallway, till finally, at 5:30 in the morning, the negotiations were not only back on track, but pretty much concluded. At 5:45am with both teams in the room, Mediator Paul Roose--a brilliant and gentle man if ever there was one--proposed a toast to "the Women's Caucus".
MEMBERSHIP MATTERS
It's a safe bet that this contract will be overwhelmingly ratified. And I am grateful to have been a part of this amazing CUE Bargaining Team. (Thanks, Susan Ervin, for suggesting that I run for the office.)
In order to vote, it's necessary to join CUE...and fortunately that's
cheap, effective, and easy to do. PLEASE DO. You can now JOIN CUE
ONLINE at:
http://www.cueunion.org/membership_info/membformweb.pdf
Fill out the form, print, sign, and mail or fax it.
Or, on most campuses, you can join up where you vote.
PAYROLL FOR DUMMIES
Over the course of 18 months building this agreement, the CUE Bargaining Team learned about and subverted, so far as we could, a host of stupid accounting tricks UC has used over the years to avoid transparency and hang on to large chunks of the money intended for University workers. We're sure there are still more, but the new contract provides for means of discovering and redistributing these funds to CUE workers. "Joint Committee on Compensation" meetings will be held throughout the year with union, university, and neutral membership. Decisions of this body will be binding and/or submitted to binding arbitration. No more toothless "fact-finding".
The CUE team also successfully fought off UC's ability to fiddle with our retirement pensions (ala the NYC Transit Workers) before July 1 of 2007. Even after that point, any changes would have to be bargained with CUE. This was huge. As corporations across the land try to shed their responsibility to workers with many years of service by cutting promised pensions out from under them, the noble University of California has given much evidence that it wants to do the same thing. CUE and other unions may be counted upon to oppose any such action. This battle, if the University chooses to go ahead with it, will likely occur in 2007, but everybody will start planning for it right now.
THE NO-STRIKES THING
The CUE Team signed off on language that requires UC to bargain with CUE over any major change to retirement, and allows us to strike as part of those negotiations. We can also strike if the Governor's Compact doesn't come through and UC refuses to make up the money from its other vast resources.
Regarding sympathy strikes, CUE agreed that, until our contract expires, we will not promote or encourage workers to sympathy strike for other unions. All of the other unions had already given in on this point and it had become futile to hold out alone. Considering UC's original proposal, we did better in the end than the University wanted. New bargaining will commence soon enough...University workers are by no means helpless in this or any other matter.
NIGHTMARE ON FRANKLIN STREET (OAKLAND, UCOP)
From a workers' rights viewpoint, this contract is a nightmare for UC's notoriously shabby Manager and Supervisor class. Upon ratification, virtually all "discipline", including suspensions, loss of pay, and letters in personnel files surrounding your participation in the several strikes of 2005 will be rescinded, withdrawn, paid in full and otherwise "made whole". Even the "Bogus Days" will be compensated, mostly with cash.
The thousands of you who honored picket lines, waved signs and yelled like crazy people in the road deserve the thanks and respect of all whose courage failed them...those who trundled back to their desks to whack out an invoice or answer their supervisor's phone. You were magnificent, heroic... and you are wholly vindicated. CUE's Bargaining Team and legal muscle fought for you to the end, and won.
Your hard work, cheerful attitude, and tough solidarity with each other are irresistible. When our cause is just, we scare the bejesus out of them.
ALL QUIET ON THE BUBBLE-BEAT
Perhaps you knew--or perhaps you didn't--that these chronicles of CUE-UC bargaining had been effectively "gagged" for the duration of Mediation since late October. In the meantime, your ever-compliant bargaining bugger BT honored the agreement to not discuss events in mediation. Which worked fine for me because my wife and I were moving a household and mother-in-law to Santa Cruz, and frankly, the free time came in right handy.
I have been proud to read the high numbers of CUEsters who urged us to hang tough in the negotiations. Prouder still of their willingness to hit the streets again. But it's all got to be getting harder to do. We're none of us getting younger or richer or better looking, and when progress and strategy were held back from the membership by these gag-orders, it probably wasn't hard to imagine that your union was useless. I hope by now you're persuaded that it wasn't and it's not. I'm proud as hell of all of us.
Even so, I'm now pretty useless to Local 4. Laid off last May, the PERB has filed a complaint against UC about my layoff, and on January 12th, we're scheduled for a "settlement conference" in Oakland. I'll find a way to let you know how it goes. For the nonce, this "Bubble"-thing can be put to bed. (Well, OK, maybe ONE MORE...after the ratification vote.) I now live in Santa Cruz, don't work for the University anymore...waiting to see what's next. My thanks to you all for your letters, your encouragement, and your brave example. Without you, we were only hissing in the wind.
AMATULLAH: "YOU DA BOMB, GAL"
CUE workers owe a great debt of gratitude to Amatullah Alaji-Sabrie, our Chief Negotiator, and to Ari Krantz, our attorney, both of whom were also responsible for editing a veritable lather (20) of these "Bubbles." And to Mary Higgins whose detailed knowledge and fierce advocacy kept the University team (and at times, our own team) on its heels. Melinda Gandara of Santa Barbara kept everyone (and I mean EVERYONE) organized over the last four months or so. This was the most fun I've ever had working at the University of California. "God bless us, everyone!" Now it's your turn.
Whether you're a member or not, CUE is there for you. So why not be a voting, electable Member? If you need help at UCLA Local 4, visit the website (below) or call our mighty Organizers:
Unity is Intelligent. Fun. And often more Interesting than your Job.
--BT
(Bert Thomas, CUE's UCLA Bargaining Representative)
1.2.2006
Or get your Bubbles at the UCLA website.