Oregon University System getting tough with unions
Union leaders say the Oregon Uni-
versity System (OUS) is getting tough
at the table in labor negotiations this
year. In contract talks with Service Em-
ployees International Union (SEIU) Lo-
cal 503, the seven-university system is
seeking concessions on grievance pro-
cedure, seniority, overtime, and con-
tracting out — all while proposing to
shift health care costs to workers and of-
fering wage increases at less than the
rate of inflation. Local 503 represents a
4,200-member unit of facilities, IT, cler-
ical and other support workers.
The talk has a similar tenor in bar-
gaining between Portland State Univer-
sity (PSU) and American Association of
University Professors (AAUP), which
represents 1,200 full-time faculty there.
On May 16, about 175 union mem-
bers rallied at downtown Portland’s Ira
Keller Park, and criticized PSU for lav-
ish administrator salaries — and for ex-
ploiting Vietnamese immigrant workers
at an on-campus hotel.
Willamette Week reported May 8
that managers at University Place Ho-
tel hired relatives, stole tips, made
workers pay kickbacks, and pocketed
wages paid to “ghost employees” on the
payroll. Marc Nisenfeld, SEIU’s PSU
chapter president, says the union
learned about those abuses in March
and immediately notified the university
vice president — but said nearly two
months later the university had done
nothing substantive. Yet a day after get-
ting a call from Willamette Week, PSU
fired the hotel’s general manager and an
assistant.
A handful of the wronged hotel
workers attended the union rally, and
two — Dui Do and Hua Le — joined a
delegation to the office of PSU presi-
dent Wim Wiewel.
HIGH LIFE FOR EXECS , BELT -
TIGHTENING FOR WORKERS
Picket signs at the rally called atten-
tion to Wiewel making $500,000 a year.
In fact, his compensation is higher than
that — $512,786. Wiewel also lives
rent-free at a university-owned mansion
in Dunthorpe, which is cleaned twice
weekly by the same workers who clean
the hotel.
But times must remain lean for
workers, apparently. In the talks with
SEIU, OUS is proposing no general
wage increase at all for the first year, a 1
percent raise the second year, and 1 per-
cent the final month of the two-year
contract. OUS also proposes to double
workers’ share of the health insurance
premium, to 10 percent, and cap its lia-
bility for paying premium increases at
5 percent a year; workers would pay
100 percent of any premium increase
above that.
The union counter-proposal is a 2
percent raise each year, plus annual
cost-of-living increases tied to the Con-
sumer Price Index.
Scott Gallagher, PSU director of
communications, wouldn’t comment on
specifics of bargaining, but said lack of
state support makes bargaining a chal-
lenge. PSU, for example, has 10,000
more students than it did in 1995, but
gets less money from the state than it
did back then.
OUS is also proposing to eliminate
overtime pay after eight hours, get rid
of a requirement to do a feasibility
study before contracting out union
member work, and end layoff “bump-
ing rights” for senior workers.
“The proposal on contracting out
and bumping (seniority rights) go
against the basic tenets of the union,”
Nisenfeld told the Labor Press.
For its part, SEIU wants a wage floor
of $2,498 a month — the dollar amount
that would keep a family of four off
food stamps. To that, OUS agreed, in
steps: It wants to give its lowest paid
employees raises bringing them half
way to that level in the middle of the
two-year contract, and a second set of
raises to reach the floor on the last day
of the contract.
“PSU prez makes $500k” says the SEIU Local 503 picket sign. Actually, it’s
$512,786, and he lives free-of-charge in a university mansion , landscaped and
cleaned at university expense. Union members rallied May 16 to say they’re
tired of higher ed bargaining that asks workers to sacrifice.
TUITION UP ,
STATE SUPPORT DOWN
OUS takeaway demands from its
unions come even as the state university
system seeks another 5 percent tuition
increase from students. In recent
decades, tuition has risen as Oregon has
reduced its investment in the university
system. State appropriations now make
up less than 13 percent of the budget of
the state university system, and Oregon
ranks 44th in the nation for its per capita
contribution to higher education.
An April 2013 audit of OUS by the
Oregon Secretary of State’s office found
that adjusted for inflation, tuition rose
61 percent between 2001 and 2012, at
the same time state support dropped
from about $470 million a year to about
$339 million. During that time period,
the faculty-to-student ratio fell from
1:25 to 1:27. And the portion of that
state funding that services construction
project debt more than quadrupled,
from 3 percent to 13 percent.
Undergraduate full-time tuition is
$7,653 at PSU this year, a figure that
doesn’t include fees, books, and living
expenses. Some 64 percent of PSU stu-
dents who left school in 2011 had stu-
dent debt, with balances averaging
$26,287.
In contract negotiations, SEIU is
proposing that tuition increases be lim-
ited to 5 percent a year, one of several
“common good” proposals that are un-
usual in a collective bargaining context.
SEIU is also proposing that no OUS
employee take a pay or benefit cut until
JUNE 7, 2013
NORTHWEST LABOR PRESS
the state of Oregon investigates bank
fraud and takes steps to recover money
lost by pension funds to the LIBOR
scandal.
The current contract expires June 30.
Bargaining was next scheduled for June
6-7 in Eugene.
Strike at Evergreen
shuts down college
OLYMPIA — A strike by the Stu-
dent Support Services Staff Union at
The Evergreen State College virtually
shut down the college May 28.
The bargaining unit of 57 coun-
selors, advisers, resident directors, and
others voted May 15 by a 90 percent
margin to authorize job actions up to
and including strike action. Bargaining
on the first contract began 16 months
ago. The workers are members of the
Washington Federation of State Em-
ployees (WFSE), an affiliate of AF-
SCME Council 28.
The strike started shortly after 5 a.m.
after six days of mediation failed to re-
solve differences over just-cause due
process rights and a fair compensation
package.
“We have shut down Evergreen for
the day,” said Evergreen Professor
Larry Mosqueda at a mid-day strike
rally at the entrance to the college’s Red
Square.
An estimated 300 picketers from
WFSE, other unions, students, and al-
lies walked the picket line in solidarity.
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