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By Teri Bernstein May will be a busy month for Faculty Association leadership. Our efforts to get outside help to compel the administration to obey the law in a number of areas are subject to the slow timetables of the agencies and courts that have jurisdiction over the relevant matters, but progress is being made. Contract issues:
Impasse and Unfair Labor practices IMPASSE: We have two meetings with the impasse mediator, May 6 and May 14. We spent the last two sessions offering major concessions to get a settlement. It didn’t work. We have several paths we can see to settlement, but we will not “bargain with ourselves” any longer. We hope that the Board really wants to settle, and that they send their negotiators to the bargaining table with the authority to say something better than “NO” on major issues. UNFAIR LABOR PRACTICES: These cases are heard by administrative law judges at PERB, the Public Employee Relations Board; we are represented by Larry Rosenzweig, who is our regular attorney. Failure to Bargain in Good Faith, May 7: this involves several issues?failing to grant negotiators proper authority (particularly with respect to financial items); paying stipends to certain faculty and not others; unilaterally reclassifying positions from faculty to administrative; deliberately violating a memorandum of understanding; refusing to bargain load factors for new courses, and others. This is just a settlement conference; it will probably go to trial. Threats of Retaliation, May 19 and 20: (Trial) When we presented our findings on the 50% law at a Budget Committee meeting, we were told that reassigned time would be taken away from faculty and even more items would be excluded from the calculations. Both have occurred. Failure to Provide Information, May 19 and 20: (Trial; combined with case above). You’ve heard about our complaints in this area. They have failed to provide PUBLIC DOCUMENTS. Repeatedly. Over several months. Even in the lawsuit they have failed to provide these documents. We shouldn’t have to sue to get a trial balance... Lawsuit:
Forcing compliance with the 50% law Depositions on May 11 and May 13
This lawsuit is separate from our contract negotiations, but it supports those negotiations in the short and long term. The 50% law requires a minimum amount spent on instruction. The problem is, our District is really breaking the rules here, and we have to get the justice system to force them to comply. We hired a special law firm for this case (Schwartz, Steinsapier, Dohrmann and Sommers) and filed our lawsuit in November. We are making progress with getting enough information and evidence to prove the District is out of compliance. Part of that process involves deposing key administrators. Cheryl Miller will be deposed on May 11; Tom Donner on May 13. We hope to get some answers. Follow up depositions of Dr. Robertson and Herb Roney will occur in June. We hope that our efforts in impasse and at PERB will bring us closer to a contract settlement. We hope that in addition, the lawsuit provide faculty with funds to make up for mistakes in the past. We also hope that the District will be inspired to straighten up its accounting practices, and thereby provide us with the assurance that they are spending at least the legal minimum in the years to come.
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