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NEWS
STORY BY LAURA CANIDA
Photos by Jordy Villagomez and Andrew Griffin
NEW S EDITOR
Tensions are rising at Clackamas Community College as
three unions enter the holiday season without contracts
after months of bargaining.
Dozens of faculty, staff and members of the
associations walked en masse into the college Board
of Education meeting on Nov. 13 carrying posters that
said how long they worked for the college and creating
â packed board room.
Some stood behind the board members as Jane
Littlefield, a collège instructor and librarian, read à
prepared statement during public testimony.
“ I speaktoday on behalf of over 500 college employees,
to ask you for help,” Littlefield read, as members of
the other two associations stood beside her. “We are
looking to you to encourage college administrators to
do the right thing for faculty, staff, and the students we
serve and settle our three bargaining contracts.”
Clackamas Print
For the full-tim e faculty, the bargaining process
ibers of three unions, Patty DeTurk Ja ne Littlefi
started on Valentine’s Day this year. According to
Beth Hodgkinson, stand in front of the board.
numerous faculty members and staff, bargaining
should have been over by now since the current three-
year agreements expired in June 2019.
The three unions are Full-Time Faculty, Part-Time.
Faculty, and Classified, which represents employees in
areas like financial aid, IT, registration janitorial and
campus services.
Each union is asking the administration for different
things, but none has agreed yet on raises. Each union
has said they have come together to show support of
one another, something that doesn’ t typically happen.
Collective bargaining is a process that involves
negotiation between an employer, which is Clackamas
Community College, and a group of employees, which, is
the two teaching groups and the classified college staff.
Their contracts regulate salaries, working conditions,
benefits and more.
According to the part-time faculty association
president Leslie Ormandy, this is only the second time
in the history of the college that all three associations
have joined together.
. .Union representatives said that, one of their main
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sticking points is getting raises that would compensate
employees for increases they voluntarily gave up a
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decade ago to help the College.
“We are jointly demanding the college do what it
assured us 10 years ago it would do when all three
associations gave up their salary increases to see the
Lori Hall, executive director of College Relations faculty who are new to teaching at the college earn
college through the great recession,” said Ormandy, a and Marketing, said for fiscal year 2019-20, the board roughly $2,700 foi; teaching one 4-credit lecture course.
part-time instructor in the English department. “ We approved a 2.7% increase. “ There were some significant Ormandy said the 368 part-time instructors that she
were assured that once that difficult period passed, the increases given to some administrators as a result of a represents are also asking for health insurance for
college would make us whole. ”
market study completed in 2017 and implemented in people who work half-time. Last year, 87 out of the 368
Union representatives said that the top 15 college, fiscal year 2018-19.” Hall did not provide additional part-time employees were offered health insurance
administrators gave themselves 10 to 20 percent raises information on the “ significant increases.” Ormandy who worked above the 540-hour threshold. Part-time
last year, but are only offering the unions raises of also said part-time faculty want to be paid the sàme as faculty have asked for a 7°/° raise in year one of their
around three percent in the first year of their three- full-time faculty for teaching the same classes.
contracts.
year contracts.
According to Becky Fidler, vice president of the
According to the most recent contract, part-time
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theclackamasprint.com
Classified Employees Association and co-chair for the
bargaining team, “ Contract negotiations is a process;
it takes time to come to a fair agreement. Throughout
the bargaining process, classified staff have sustained
their roles of making sure that our students come first,
and continue to provide high quality services to all.”
The contract that applies to classified staff represents
198 full-time employees. They are negotiating several
articles in their contract, including those that pertain
to hours and Work conditions, wages and benefits and
retirement. Classified staff have asked for a 4.75% raise
in year one of their contracts. Pay for classified staff
ranges from approximately $21,000 at the bottom of
the pay scale to $108,000 at the top.
Kathyrn Long, full-tim e faculty president and a
member of the bargaining team, _ said workload has
increased as the college has cut full-tim e faculty
positions in the past 10 years.
“Years past, there were 160 FTF; currently there are
approximately 136 FTF,” said Long, who teaches English
as a Second Language. “ But even though we’ve decreased
t our numbers, the types of work that w e’re doing h a s'
increased, like things related to Guided Pathways and
Stuff related to assessment and accreditation.”
Long said that' full-tim e faculty have asked for a 7.7%
raise in year one of their contracts.
“ The administration has offered 2.9%, which doesn’t
even account for the recent huge jumps in inflation,”
said Long. “ The 7.7% adjusts for increases in the cost of
living in recent years and brings our compensation in
line with that of tomparable institutions. We did make
these huge sacrifices 10 years ago, each association.
From that time, we worked harder with fewer resources,
and we agreed to make the sacrifices because we love
what we do and we love our students.”
Full-time faculty starting pay ranges from roughly
$56,000 for a new full-tim e instructor to $87,000 for
an instructor at the top of the salary scale. -
Every one of the three unions’ contracts are viewable
online at clackamas.edu.
College administration officials said they were not
available for in-person interview requests, but wrote
via email, “We are currently bargaining with all three
groups, and we highly value the staff and faculty in all
the associations. The bargaining process takes time and
this year is taking longer than usual, but we are making
steady progress. We are committed to working with each
association to reach agreement. We are also committed
to closing bargaining as soon as possible so it does riot
impact students and learning. There are challenges we
also need to consider, such as increased costs associated
with PERS and inadequate state funding.”
Each association continues to meet with the
administrative, bargaining team. Part time faculty
and classified associations have opening bargaining
sessions; they both met as recently as Monday. Full
time faculty have closed sessions and will meet again
this Friday, Nov. 22.
November 20,2019