Bargaining XIV: New union proposal trims ATB and equity, increases merit

Last updated on 06/05/2015

6/4/2015: Bargaining XIV:

Check the UAUO facebook blog here, I”m only blogging the end of the meeting today, missed the rest for class. Last session ended with this response from Dave Cecil, to the admin’s proposal for “intense negotiations”.

Regarding your idea of an intense session to resolve our differences, we can’t do that because we’re so far apart right now. If you had moved closer to our position, we could to that, but without more progress from you my members would not accept an intense negotiation.

The UO faculty last received raises on July 1, 2014. Last week the admins proposed that we wait 18 months for this:

Jan 1 2016:
1% ATB
0% Merit
0% Equity

And then wait another 12 months for this:

Jan 1 2017:
0% ATB
1.5% Merit pool by unit (But up to 20% held back at Dean’s discretion.)
0% Equity

I’m no algebra professor, but that’s total of 2.5% over two-and-a-half years. Nominal, not real. That was our administration’s response to the union’s proposal for

Jan 1 2016:
2.5% ATB
1.5% Merit
1.0% External equity pool, to be allocated across rank and dept. based on AAU public averages. No external equity raise from this pool to exceed 10%.

Jan 1 2017:
2.5% ATB
1.5% Merit
1.0% Internal equity pool for each department

Today, the union’s counter-proposal cuts a little of the ATB, bumps up the Merit a little, cuts the Equity a little:

Jan 2016:
2.0% ATB
1.5% Merit

Jan 2017:
2.0% ATB
1.75% Merit
1.25% Internal and external equity pool.

Salary at other AAU publics increased 3.4% this year. UO’s proposed raises have been delayed past the normal July 1 start date, until Jan 1 2016. Spread out over 2.5 years, the union proposal will mean we will lose ground relative to the AAU.

It’s going to be a long summer folks. But no new bargaining meetings until the first week in July.

Session is over but they’re still talking. Bill Brady makes the mistake of confusing the cost to UO of the PERS retirement package with its value to current UO employees. Here’s an easy way to keep it straight, Bill:

When the State of Oregon must jack up UO’s PERS payments in order to meet our obligation to cover the $550,000 a year PERS tab for Mike Bellotti and his wife, yes, that is a cost to UO.

But that cost is not in any fucking way whatsoever a benefit of any value to the UO faculty, with whom you are bargaining.

5/28/2015: Bargaining XIII: UO administration proposes to cut the faculty’s real wages

Average AAU pay is increasing at 3.4% a year, cost of living (for Portland) is increasing at about 2.4% a year, and Eugene house prices are increasing at about 3% a year.

The UO administration thinks the faculty should get a 0% raise for 2015, a 1% raise in 2016, and 1.5% for 2017.

And they’re taking back our long-promised $600 Chevy Van money. Bummer, dude. Come tonight at 6PM to 115 Lawrence to see the AAUP’s Howard Bunsis explain how much money UO really has, and how they are spending it.

Jan 1 2016:
1% ATB
0% Merit
0% Equity

Jan 1 2017:
0% ATB
1.5% Merit pool by unit (But up to 20% held back at Dean’s discretion.)
0% Equity

Minor increases in NTTF floors – from $36K to $36.8K. For PE, $24.5K. For RAs, $32.7K. Instead of dealing with compression via 8% raises for full profs after each good 6th year review, they only want to give 2% for reviews after the first.

Live blog:

Rumor has it they’re going to up their last offer of $600 Chevy Van money and a 1% merit pool that doesn’t even start until 2017 to “whatever faculty can carry out of the Duck’s $95M Hatfield Dowling Complex“.

History below the break, also check the UAUO facebook blog here, and don’t miss the Bunsis talk “Is UO Really Broke?” tonight at 6, 115 Lawrence. Open to the public:

Cecil is warming things up by running circles around the admin team over Article 28 on parking. Done. All very good-natured on both sides, as is typical of these sessions.

Now he’s on Ethics and Professional Responsibility, Article 36. The union is not going to give in to the administration’s desire to be able to discipline faculty for what they are calling “discrimination” and “harassment”, even when the behavior doesn’t fall under the legal definitions of discrimination and harassment. Psaki brings up examples of past abuses of this looser standard by UO.

Now it’s academic classification – the union wants to end the use of “adjunct professor” on the grounds that it can hurt the job prospects of newly minted PhDs. For reasons that are unclear the administration wants to keep it.

Bill Brady presents Article 19: NTTF Review and Promotion, for the administration. The basic question is how long an NTTF must be here to be eligible for promotion. Both sides agree it’s 6 years, the question is how to handle part-timers and intermittent NTTF’s. Suppose we’ve got an expert teaching one specialized business course per year, every year for 6 years. Should they be allowed to go up for promotion and use the “Career” title? Union says yes, administration says no – years only count if 0.4 FTE or above. UAO bargaining team member Larry Wayte (Music – I gotta check out his History of the Blues course) brings up himself – 4 years at 0.375, full time next year. None of his first 4 years will count under the administration’s proposal.

3:09: Finally, on to economics:

They’re taking back the $600 Chevy Van money. Bummer.

Jan 1 2016:
1% ATB
0% Merit pool
0% Equity

Jan 1 2017:
0% ATB
1.5% Merit pool by unit (But up to 20% held back at Dean’s discretion.)
0% Equity

Minor increases in NTTF floors – from $36K to $36.8K. For PE, $24.5K. For RAs, $32.7K.

Instead of dealing with compression via 8% raises for full profs after each good 6th year review, they only want to give 2% for reviews after the first.

I’ve gotta go, read the UAUO facebook blog for more, here.

5/21/2015: Bargaining XII: Parking for jocks not profs, harassment, still no raises

They’re on parking. Check out this classic Daily Emerald story on how UO parking fees from faculty, staff, and students subsidized the Matt Court underground parking garage, here. Then there’s the athlete only parking lot Phil Knight made UO build as part of the Jock Box “gift”. More here, here, ad infinitum.

Now it’s Ethics and Professional Responsibility, Article 36. This was one of Sharon Rudnick and Tim Gleason’s favorite articles last time around. They wanted a loose definition of harassment, which would allow the administration to discipline faculty at their discretion. Cecil and Mauer insisted on using the standard definition of “illegal harassment”. Now Bill Brady and the admin team are trying to bring back the looser definition. What would count? Incivility – as defined by whom? Inappropriate sighing during faculty meetings? Don’t go after me for being ironic, it’s happened:

[Professor of English] Thomas Docherty was banned from the University of Warwick in January for allegedly giving off “negative vibes” and undermining the authority of the former head of his department.

The case against him included “inappropriate sighing”, “making ironic comments” and “projecting negative body language”.

In other news, the administration will make a response to the union’s raise proposal at next Thursday’s session. Be there.

5/14/2015: Bargaining XI: The admins have been telling President Schill that the *union* opposes merit pay?

Cocktail party version:

The faculty union’s initial proposal for 2015-17 pay included 6% for merit. The administration’s bargaining team response was 1%. And yet yesterday President Schill told the Senate that his understanding was that faculty union was opposed to merit pay. I wonder which administrator spun it that way?

Today the union came back with a proposal for 3% for merit. I wonder what the the admins new spin will be.

Overall, including ATB and equity, the union proposal is 5% for 2016 and 5% for 2017. Details at bottom.

5/14/2015: Bargaining in the Knight library collaboration room, 2-6PM Thursday. Check Luebke’s blog too.

Live-blog of the faculty union’s initial salary proposal from Feb is here,  It would have got faculty pay to the Lariviere target of the average AAU-public – with plenty of allowance for merit variation.

Our administration’s response was “sorry, we spent all that money on administrators”:

The pdf of the union’s February proposal is here. The NTTF and TTF proposals were similar, I’ll focus on the TTF:

July 2015:
2.5% ATB
2.0% Merit
1.0% Internal equity pool for each department
1.5% External equity pool, to be allocated across rank and dept. based on AAU public averages. No external equity raise from this pool to exceed 5%.

July 2016:
2.5% ATB
4.0% Merit

As you can see, the union put a substantial weight on merit. The largest weight. Over the two years, 6% for merit, 2.5% for equity, and 5% for across the board.

Based on his Senate comments yesterday, someone on the administration’s bargaining team seems to have drastically misinformed incoming President Michael Schill about the union’s objectives. He’d apparently been told it was the union that was opposed to merit. No.

On April 10th, the administration’s bargainers came back with a counter-proposal. It would eliminate all but 1% of the union’s proposed merit increases, and delay even that 1% until the last 6 months of the contract. PDF here:

The administration also eliminated the ATB, and all the equity pool, replacing it with a onetime flat $600. What does that reveal about the administration’s supposed focus on merit?

On equity, the union’s proposal in February was focused on getting faculty to the AAU peer objective laid out by Richard Lariviere and Jim Bean, years ago. Here’s the TTF language:

2:35 PM today. Cecil presents the union response to the administration’s 0%/1% counter:

Bill Brady says something odd about theApril 0%/1% not being a counter-proposal. He seems upset. Anyway, here’s the union counter to the admin’s counter:

Jan 2016:
2.5% ATB
1.5% Merit
1.0% External equity pool, to be allocated across rank and dept. based on AAU public averages. No external equity raise from this pool to exceed 10%.

Jan 2017:
2.5% ATB
1.5% Merit
1.0% Internal equity pool for each department

Cecil does a great great job explaining all this. The UAUO proposal should be on the website here, soon. (It’s article 26. It also includes 6 year review raises, floors for NTTF’s, etc.)

The admin team leaves for a brief caucus, comes back but with no response. WTF?

I’ve got to go, bargaining XII will be next Th at 2PM, meanwhile check Luebke’s blog.