Oregon unions sign tentative pacts for 22,000 state workers
SEIU and AFSCME
members will get
modest cost-of-
living raises
The State of Oregon reached agree-
ment July 18 and 19 with its two largest
union groups, signing tentative agree-
ments that, when ratified, will cover
22,000 state workers.
The new agreements provide a 1.5
percent cost-of-living raise Dec. 1,
2013, and 2 percent Dec. 1, 2014. They
also end a freeze in step pay increases,
and contain no further furlough days —
two concessions that workers agreed to
two years ago when the state was in fis-
cal crisis.
State negotiators dropped proposals
to make employees pay 100 percent of
health insurance premium increases
over 5 percent. In the new agreements,
workers would continue to pay 5 per-
cent of health insurance premiums.
And starting 2015, employees who
choose the least expensive health plan
available to them will see their share of
the premium decrease to 3 percent.
A unit of 19,000 workers repre-
sented by Service Employees Interna-
tional Union (SEIU) Local 503 was the
first to reach agreement — six days af-
ter Local 503 gave a 10-day strike no-
tice. Oregon-AFSCME (American
Federation of State County and Munic-
ipal Employees) concluded a deal on
nearly-identical terms the following
day, which will cover another 3,000
workers. One difference: In the AF-
SCME contract, if health insurance
premiums increase less than forecasted,
workers would get their cost-of-living
raises early — one month early for
every 1.6 percentage points less than 5
percent.
The two-year contracts are retroac-
tive to July 1 and run through June 30,
2015.
The big state worker agreement is
sometimes called the DAS contract, be-
cause it’s negotiated by the Department
of Administrative Services on behalf of
nearly all state agencies. Together with
side agreements, the DAS contracts run
up to 160 pages, and spell out pay, ben-
efits, work rules, and disciplinary pro-
cedures.
SEIU this year made several un-
usual “common good” proposals, in-
cluding a call for investigation into how
the LIBOR bank fraud scandal may
have hurt public worker pension and
other state funds. But when bargaining
reached formal “impasse,” those pro-
posals were declared “permissive” sub-
jects of bargaining, meaning the state,
by law, didn’t have to consider them.
Ratification votes are expected to
take place in the coming weeks and
conclude by mid-August. The SEIU
vote will take place statewide, by mail
ballot. The AFSCME ratification vote
takes place agency by agency, and
some agencies, like DEQ and the De-
partment of State Lands, are still in “lo-
cal table” negotiations that could go to
the second week of August.
Still being negotiated are state con-
tracts covering 3,000 workers in two
AFSCME-represented units in the De-
partment of Corrections, and SEIU-rep-
resented units covering 20,000 state-
paid in-home care providers and 4,000
workers in the Oregon University Sys-
tem (OUS). The OUS negotiations are
particularly contentious this year: State
negotiators are demanding concessions
in cherished union contract provisions
like seniority rights during layoffs, over-
time pay after eight hours, and safe-
guards against privatization. On July 29,
SEIU began circulating a member peti-
tion in support of strike authorization at
OUS.
David Cecil named chief of staff at AFT-Oregon
David Cecil has been named to the
newly created position of chief of staff
for the American Federation of Teach-
ers (AFT)-Oregon.
AFT-Oregon represents roughly
12,000 Oregon workers from 20 locals
in K-12, community college and higher
education in faculty and classified po-
sitions; and child care workers, in both
public and private sectors.
The chief of staff directs and coordi-
nates AFT-Oregon staff, programs, and
operations, and reports directly to the
president of the council, David Rives.
AFT-Oregon chose this new direc-
tion with the retirement in February of
Richard Schwarz, who served 24 years
as AFT-Oregon executive director.
Cecil brings over 13 years as a union
leader, organizer, and labor relations
Anderson appointed
to high-level post at
UFCW convention
United Food and Commercial Work-
ers (UFCW) Local 555 Secretary
Treasurer Jeff Ander-
son has been appointed
co-chair of the Rules
Committee for the in-
ternational union’s
convention Aug. 12-16
in Chicago.
The appointment
was made by UFCW
International President Joe Hansen.
This is the first time that a member
of the Oregon local has held a high-
level position at the convention, accord-
ing to Anderson.
“I consider this a high honor for Lo-
cal 555 and recognition of the work we
are doing,” Anderson said.
UFCW Local 555, the largest pri-
vate-sector union in Oregon with a
membership of over 19,000, will send
24 delegates to the convention, which is
held every five years.
PAGE 8
specialist to the post.
He joined AFT Lo-
cal 3544 in 1999 as a
Graduate Teaching
Fellow in the history
department at the Uni-
versity of Oregon in
Eugene. He served as
an officer in the local
until 2002, when he was hired as organ-
izer. In 2011, he began work on the suc-
cessful United Academics at University
of Oregon organizing campaign, help-
ing to form AFT-Oregon’s newest unit,
which now represents 1,800 faculty at
the UO in Eugene.
He joined AFT-Oregon staff in Au-
gust 2012 as labor relations specialist.
Recently, he has assisted United Aca-
demics in their efforts to achieve a first
collective bargaining agreement with
the UO.
“I’m excited because there’s a lot of
potential in AFT-Oregon,” Cecil said.
“The labor movement is at a crucial
point in its history. And, the way to be
successful in growing the union is to
have active locals with members who
understand the value of their union, not
just in the workplace, but in the com-
munity as well. I’m committed to help-
ing AFT-Oregon locals and members
strengthen our union, and the move-
ment as a whole.”
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