Category Archives: The Strike of 2006

Go ahead and comment if you have impressions of the faculty meeting today in Roosevelt Hall on the contract. Here’s a link to the EMU-AAUP’s web site with the unfortunate headline “Administration Accepts Fact-finding, But Has Unacceptably Weak Response on Domestic Partner Benefit Loss.” Even in settlement, it seems combative.

Personally, I think the administration– and the union, for that matter– find themselves between a rock and a hard place on domestic partner benefits created by some homophobic and hateful legislation and court rulings. However, I suspect that the MOUs that were brought by Elaine Martin here are about as good as we’re going to get. At least until this goes through the courts.

But hey, I wasn’t at the meeting today. What do those of you who were there think?

… because today the faculty union and the administration are talking about the deal from fact finding. Let’s hope it all works out!

UPDATE:

Perhaps we have a deal?  This just in from Mullen speaking for Fallon:

MESSAGE TO THE UNIVERSITY COMMUNITY

On Monday, the university and the EMU Chapter of the AAUP received the
report of the fact finder.  Over the next four days, I worked with
others toward a comprehensive and systematic financial analysis of the
report’s recommendations, an assessment of its strategic implications
and a full understanding of the details.  In addition, I consulted with
key personnel on campus and the university’s Board of Regents.  Based
upon the sum of these actions, I am pleased to announce that the
administration will accept the fact finder’s recommendations for the
negotiations process.

This morning, members of the administration and AAUP bargaining teams
are working closely together on finalizing contract language.  I am
hopeful that a resolution will be reached soon, today if possible,
leading to a tentative agreement.

I look forward to working collaboratively to move the university forward
in service to its mission.  I will update you as developments occur.

Toward a stronger university,

John A. Fallon, III
President

Um, so does that mean we have a deal, or what?

I just heard on NPR that the California State University system faculty has agreed to a deal with the administration.  Here are the opening paragraphs from the “Inside Bay Area” web site, which is put out by the Oakland Tribune:

The union representing 24,000 California State University faculty members has agreed to a tentative contract that would hike professors’ pay nearly 25 percent over four years and avert a strike at the 417,000-student system.The agreement, announced Tuesday, must be ratified by union members and the Cal State Board of Trustees. The breakthrough came after two years of negotiations and just days before two-day walkouts were to begin on the system’s 23 campuses.

A strike would have been the largest in U.S. higher-education history. Faculty leaders said they would stall strike plans while the contract was being finalized.

Let’s hope that we get to something similar….

Cal State University has been in the news lately over an impending strike and contract negotiations. The story seems to mirror the circumstances at EMU in some ways, just further down the road in the process. They’ve been without a new contract since June of 2005. They also brought in a fact finder.

Travis portrayed the fact-finder’s proposals as “close enough” to the union’s previous demands and said the report could form the outlines of a pact. In complicated formulas, the report suggested salary raises totaling 24.87%, just short of the 25.2% the union sought. Additional merit and longevity raises would sweeten the plan.

However, they are still negotiating and have extended the contract for 10 more days. It’ll be interesting to see what comes of their situation.

My “day job” has kept me especially busy lately, so it just wasn’t in the cards for me to try to attend any of the fact finding hearings yesterday. But I wonder if anyone out there in EMUtalk-land did, and I wonder if any of you would-be reporters would like to report? And also, there are hearings again today (Wednesday, February 21) in room 330 of the Student Center, another chance to go and hear the hearings.
Mind you, I’m not looking for cheerleading from the AAUP– not that that isn’t important, because it is. It’s just inevitably biased. BTW, you can find links to still more slides here; no narrative on the web yet about the hearings from the union folks, other than a sort of summary the slides. And obviously, I’m not looking for cheerleading from the administration either– I have no idea where they are posting stuff about these talks.

Rather, I’m just of looking for some impressions. What are these talks “like”?

Bunsis said that the talks are liable to conclude today, 2/21 (I thought these things were going on into March, actually), so today might be your last chance. It’d be tight with other things on my schedule, but I might try to swing by this morning for a look.

Anyway, if anyone out there has impression based on eye-witnessing, post ‘em here.

Two Updates:

• The EMU administration stuff on Fact Finding is here.
• One of my colleagues pointed to an interesting statement/press release on some of the recent statements from Loppnow on Fact Finding here.  Just to quote the last three sentences:  “The University has always intended to give the Fact Finder’s recommendations serious consideration in an effort to arrive at an agreement.  I know we all share the hope that this process will help us reach a mutually agreeable solution to our contract difficulties. I believe both the administration and the union are committed to this end and to moving forward in a more positive manner.”  This strikes me as being closer to embracing the FF process than some other recent statements (as discussed here), but not exactly the full “we’ll take what the Fact Finder gives us” kind of statement that the union wants.