On Monday, March 6th, your AFT 2121 bargaining team met with the District and presented two crucial proposals. Yet, once again, the District team that David Martin has appointed was unprepared to bargain in good faith.
The first proposal presented by your bargaining team was expanded medical insurance. Taking advantage of new legislation would bring in $1.6 million in ongoing, stable funding from the State while increasing the number of faculty eligible for medical benefits. It would lower the bar for faculty to qualify for benefits to 40% load, instead of the current 50%. More details here. It’s an obvious win-win for everyone. Other colleges around the state are making similar agreements, and the new money is already reflected in the budget that David Martin presented to the community last week.
A responsible District would jump at the opportunity to bring in more money. But yesterday, the District team expressed no interest in the proposal. At first, they wouldn’t even agree to discuss it at our next session. But under pressure from AFT Executive Director Alayna Fredricks, they finally agreed to put it on the agenda.
The second proposal presented by your bargaining team was full restoration of wage concessions. When we took wage concessions in the 21-22 academic year, part of the agreement was that if more funding became available, we would go back to the table. Now we have the actuals from the concessionary year, and the numbers clearly show that City College’s financials ended up in much better shape than the district was projecting, and we demand that the district restore our wages.
The District team came unprepared. Although they were aware of the topics of discussion well in advance of our session, there was no one present who understood the budget well enough to discuss our proposals with any authority. This kind of foot-dragging does not meet the District’s legal obligation to bargain in good faith. When pressed, the District team couldn’t even make a commitment to bargain in good faith at our next session. The most they could say was that they would “try” to have someone present who could discuss District finances and actually negotiate.
Unfortunately this behavior is not new. Last fall AFT 2121 filed a ULP (unfair labor practice) about this exact behavior; we’re currently awaiting the judge’s decision. Despite this recent history, David Martin continues to set his teams up for failure, scheduling sessions where no one on the District side has the authority or the knowledge to actually bargain. Now more than ever, we need to show the district that faculty are united and ready to fight:
• Come to the next bargaining session! Let the District see your faces and your strength.
The next Bargaining session is March 21, 2:00-3:30. Location to be determined. If it’s in person, it will be on the Ocean Campus, right before our General Membership meeting. If it’s on Zoom, you can register here, or use the same link you already have if you registered.
• Fill out your bargaining survey: https://bit.ly/BargainSurvey . A survey may seem like a small thing, but it actually has a huge impact. It is how your team demonstrates that AFT 2121 proposals have the support of faculty–and that’s how we win the contract we deserve.
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