Bargaining Update on Yesterday’s Session From David Pieper | Member Meeting Today 3:30pm at Ocean Campus

Posted on October 17, 2023 by AFT 2121

Voices from the Bargaining Table: David Pieper on Yesterday’s Session

I am a faculty member in the Social Sciences Department who is also a member of our AFT Bargaining Team. We had a session on Monday (10/16), and I wanted to share my perspective on the state of negotiations.

I have been associated with CCSF for nearly a quarter of a century, first as a student, and as a faculty member since 2009 part-time and then full-time. From this experience, I am deeply familiar with our vital mission to serve students, as well as the challenges faced by both part-time and full-time faculty.

What happened at Monday’s session?

The college’s budget was the main topic of discussion. This is critical because we all know that our faculty are not paid competitively and the district needs to find ways to increase salaries while maintaining a balanced budget. Instead of negotiating a fair contract with AFT, Chancellor David Martin and the district choose to spend their money on other things.

Your union is determined to help the district find ways to rearrange priorities to allow for competitive salaries, something that is essential for retaining and attracting the quality faculty who make City College programs run.

We need to understand how the budget numbers are developed and spending is prioritized. AFT has been asking the same questions for many months, so the district should have been prepared. Instead, they sent a newly hired finance person who was not involved in developing the budget and was therefore unable to answer many questions. On the bright side, he did treat our union team respectfully and he promised to get us answers by the end of the week. But even though the bargaining dates were chosen by the district, they were not able to send a representative who was prepared to answer questions today, and they could not commit that any representative from finance would be able to attend next week’s scheduled bargaining session. This is still sadly the definition of bad faith bargaining.

We did learn some useful things. The district has not included the new state reimbursement for part-time faculty health care in the budget because they are waiting for exact actual numbers. They seem not to understand that budgets are always projected estimates, and you can’t wait for exact actuals before creating a budget. In addition, they are including full salaries and benefits for open positions that the district has no intention or process in place to fill any time soon. Both of these facts mean that the district has more money available to increase faculty salaries than they claim.

We also saw some incremental movement in other areas. The district made a counter proposal on class size that brought our positions slightly closer together. AFT made counter proposals on leaves and compensation that are designed to be more acceptable to the district. No tentative agreements were reached at Monday’s meeting, however.

What can you do for a higher salary and a fair contract?

If you feel that you deserve higher pay, join your fellow union members at the October 26th Board of Trustees meeting to demand that CCSF faculty be paid competitively and receive retroactive pay for the unneeded concessions made in earlier years. Our students’ success depends on highly qualified and motivated faculty who can afford to live in our expensive region. RSVP for Oct 26 here: https://bit.ly/Oct26MUB

The Details:

Date: Thursday, October 26th
Time: 5 pm
Location: In front of East entrance of MUB building, Ocean Campus
Note: Faculty can plan to attend the Board meeting or join other faculty outside of the building

–David

General Membership Meeting In Person Today Tues. 3:30-5PM Wellness Center, Room 103

Come find out what is happening in bargaining for our next contract from members of your Bargaining Team and get ready for your October 26 Rally for a Fair Contract. Enough is enough–it’s time to take action for the fair contract we deserve. All members are encouraged to attend!

General Membership Meeting Agenda is here

Posted in E-news Archives, Negotiations

Bargaining Update on Yesterday’s Session From Dora Rodriguez

Posted on October 10, 2023 by AFT 2121

Voices from the Bargaining Table: Dora Rodriguez on Yesterday’s Session

I am a faculty member in the Disabled Student Programs and Services Department who is also a member of our AFT Bargaining Team. We had a session on Monday at Mid-Semester Flex (10/9), and I wanted to share my perspective on the state of negotiations.

I have spent 36 years of my life at CCSF, as a freshman in 1987, as an instructional aide in 1990, as a part-time instructor in 1998 and a full-time member since 2001. From this experience, I know the importance of serving students, and I appreciate our dedicated faculty.

What happened at Monday’s session?

Based on yesterday’s session, I would like to reiterate my colleague Megan Sweeney’s statement, “Faculty need competitive wages to live in this expensive region during a period of record inflation and for the college to attract and retain faculty.”

At Monday’s session, AFT received four District counter proposals on salaries, facilities, paid training for online courses, and parental leave. On the key issue of salary, I remain deeply frustrated by Chancellor Martin and his team. The District offered a 2-year contract agreement that includes a 5% increase for 23-24, a 4% increase for 24-5, and a partial (roughly ⅓) restoration of our 21-22 concessionary year–none of which comes close to meeting COLA or giving faculty the full restoration we’re due. The District’s salary proposal would leave CCSF faculty salaries well below what other Bay Area colleges offer. This is disrespectful to faculty and threatens the health of our programs.

The District Finance Team showed a $9 million surplus in the current academic year and justified much of their proposal on the basis of doom and gloom speculations about the long term, with assumptions such as no one retiring in the next 5 years.

What can you do for a higher salary and a fair contract?

Dear ALL Underpaid Faculty, All Hands On Deck! Let’s stand in solidarity at the October 26th Board of Trustees meeting. They need to hear our Faculty roar! Raise faculty salaries to competitive Bay 10 median salaries! Return our retroactive pay! Our livelihood depends on it! The health of our programs are at stake!

Please commit to attending the Board of Trustees meeting by by signing here: https://bit.ly/Oct26MUB.

Oct 26 Rally Details:

–Dora

Posted in E-news Archives, Negotiations

Q&A with District Supervisor Candidates facilitated by faculty member Erik Christianson

Posted on October 10, 2023 by AFT 2121

Q&A with District Supervisor Candidates Tuesday 10/17, 12-1:30 pm on Zoom – COPE

AFT will be hosting a Q&A with supervisorial candidates Myrna Melgar (District 7), Connie Chan (District 1), Jackie Fielder (District 9), and Dean Preston (District 5 (TBD)) on October 17th. The meeting will be facilitated by Erik Christianson, an AFT faculty member and new External Political Organizer.

All members are encouraged to attend your Committee on Political Education on Tuesday 10/17, 12-1:30 PM, on Zoom.

COPE Agenda is here.

The link is the same as for past COPE meetings – follow this link from your computer or smartphone. Meeting ID: 810 1671 8065, Password: 783119.

Posted in E-news Archives

OPEB & COVID Sick Leave Update

Posted on October 6, 2023 by AFT 2121

What’s all this about OPEB?

OPEB, which stands for Other Post-Employee Benefits, is a system to jointly (through both employer and employee contributions) prefund health benefits that full time faculty will receive after they retire. If you’ve been following our Board of Trustees meetings, you know that accurately budgeting for employer-side OPEB contributions has been a recent topic of interest. The topic of employee contributions is wholly separate and involves understanding the history of how these deductions came to be.

So how is OPEB supposed to work for employees? When CCSF joined the Retiree Health Care Trust Fund, CCSF needed to comply with the employer and employee contribution requirements. In July 2016, following negotiations with AFT, the process of collecting employee deductions began.

The agreement reached, and ultimately codified in Article 21 F of the AFT contract, is as follows:

— Full-timers hired before January 1, 2014: The deduction is 0.25%. It will rise 0.25% per year to a max of 1%.
— Full-timers hired on or after January 1, 2014: The deduction is 2%.

These deductions are only applied to faculty who are full-time general fund employees (who are also eligible for this benefit). Categorical (grant-funded) employees are not eligible, even if they are full-time.

What’s happening now? A few months ago, a couple faculty members brought a concern about incorrect OPEB deductions in their paychecks to your AFT 2121 Grievance Team. (Note: The AFT 2121 Grievance Team is the team that deals with issues of the District improperly following our contract or failing to follow our contract.) We determined that these faculty were indeed being over-deducted, and we initiated the grievance process with the District over their misapplication of Article 21F of our contract.

This week, the AFT 2121 Grievance Team has responded to more inquiries about the faculty side of OPEB contributions along with concerns and inaccuracies about the status of this grievance.

Part of this grievance process includes first gathering payroll information from the District to determine the extent of the issue. We are still trying to get complete and accurate data from the District to determine the scope of the problem, specific individuals affected and amounts involved. While the parties are still in the process of going through over 40,000 payroll records, it appears that there have been both over and under deductions. This grievance will likely affect a large, still unknown number of faculty and because it is related to pay, getting accurate accounting for each faculty member is essential. When the team determines that you are impacted and calculates the amount you are owed, you will receive notification that provides further details.

That said, you can also support the process and take action by filling out the payroll reporting form: https://leadernet.aft.org/webform/report-payroll-problems. This form isn’t specific to OPEB issues; it’s the same form faculty normally use to report pay issues. This form reports directly to the payroll department, and if more faculty are filling out the form, it helps the Administration recognize the scope of the issue. The form also reports to AFT 2121, which helps us continue to advance on this issue, track complaints, and stay in touch with those affected.

Update: COVID Sick Leave

Last Spring, faculty finally won an agreement to be credited with our COVID sick leave.

To nobody’s surprise, implementation has been slow and full of errors.

HR and AFT 2121 agreed that the office of instruction didn’t have complete records of who was in–person. So instead of using the office of instruction information, the District had chairs and deans report our hours to HR. But when they posted the information on our employee dashboards at the end of summer, here’s what we’ve found:

Some faculty have sick leave showing but the numbers are wrong. Some are close, some are not so close, but in every case we’ve seen, the number showing is less than what it should be.
Some faculty have zero COVID hours showing even though they worked in person. All librarians are in this group – the whole department.
All the COVID sick leave is listed as hours, so what should be five days comes out as five hours.
In fact, we have not yet found a single instance where the numbers posted on the Employee Dashboard are correct, except in cases where the correct number is zero.

This week, the AFT 2121 grievance team found the reason. It turns out that even though the District earlier had acknowledged that the office of instruction didn’t have all the information, they used the office of instruction data on our employee dashboards. Payroll might have the correct numbers that the chairs and deans submitted, but faculty can’t see those numbers.

HR has not given a timeline for getting the correct leave posted. Your Grievance Team will continue to push for proper implementation of our agreement.

Posted in E-news Archives

Bargaining Update on Last Monday From Megan Sweeney | General Membership Mting 10/17 at 3pm

Posted on October 4, 2023 by AFT 2121

Voices from the Bargaining Table: Megan Sweeney on Last Week’s Session

I am a faculty member in the Social Sciences Department who is also a member of our AFT Bargaining Team. We had a session last Monday (9/25), and I wanted to share my perspective on the state of negotiations.

Frankly, I’m incredibly frustrated by the lack of substantive progress on the economic components of bargaining, namely our salaries and restoration. The district repeatedly has come to the table unprepared to bargain over economics. The district is stalling and does not appear to value faculty as dedicated professionals who tirelessly serve our students.

What happened at Monday’s session?
At last Monday’s session, AFT presented four counter-proposals with justifications for each. Chancellor Martin and his team, despite having a month to prepare, presented no proposals, only a “supposal” on the idea of a shorter one to two year agreement. The District also again failed to send a representative from their finance office and again their team was unprepared to have substantial discussion regarding the budget.

As a full-time faculty member and a mother of three children, my schedule is beyond busy right now. Yet I’m making time to prepare for bargaining and engage in this process because I know how important this is for my colleagues and students. It is disheartening to engage in this process with a counterparty that does not appear to value the dedication and professionalism of its faculty.

That’s why I’m calling on ALL faculty to turn out to the October 26th Board of Trustees meeting. We need to communicate loud and clear that the status quo is not acceptable.

Faculty have communicated that pay is their number one concern and AFT 2121’s bargaining team’s # 1 priority is raising faculty salaries to the Bay 10 median. See details here. Faculty need competitive wages to live in this expensive region during a period of record inflation and for the college to attract and retain faculty.

Please commit to attending the Board of Trustees meeting by by signing here: https://bit.ly/Oct26MUB. I will be there on October 26 and hope to see you there as well!

The Details:
Date: Thursday, October 26th
Time: 5 pm
Location: In front of East entrance of MUB building, Ocean Campus
Note: Faculty can plan to attend the Board meeting or join other faculty outside of the building

Please get this date in your calendar and plan to attend!

General Membership Meeting In Person @ Ocean Tuesday, 10/17, 3:30-5 PM

Tuesday 10/17: Committee on Political Education (12-1:30 PM) & General Membership Meeting (3:30-5pm). The room for the GMM is still TBD – we’ll update this space once the location is confirmed.

General Membership Meeting Agenda is here

Posted in E-news Archives, Negotiations

What does Chancellor Martin leaving mean for Oct 26 & your contract?

Posted on September 21, 2023 by AFT 2121

Dear Colleagues,

Many of you have probably already seen Chancellor Martin’s announcement that he will not be returning to the college next year. To time this announcement just before the accreditation visit is unfortunate, and we frankly believe that our community deserved better.

Our students deserve a Chancellor who is committed to growing our college, treating its employees fairly, and sticking with the vital task of fulfilling our mission as San Francisco’s largest and most accessible source for degrees, high quality jobs, and hope. We’re confident that with our current Board, we can hire such a Chancellor.

The news today, however, means the Oct 26 Rally is even more important–even if a change in leadership is coming, faculty deserve good faith bargaining and a fair contract now.

Unfortunately, the Chancellor will likely feel even more free to ignore his Board’s guidance and continue to bargain in bad faith, which means he needs to see on Oct 26 that faculty are united and ready to go on strike if that is what it takes to receive fair treatment and a fair contract.

We all need to be talking to our colleagues about October 26 and why it is time to show up for each other. We need to send a clear message to our Board and David Martin that faculty deserve the respect of good faith negotiations for more competitive salaries & a fair contract right now.

If your precinct rep or other AFT 2121 organizer hasn’t already talked to you about October 26, please contact them or respond to this message to say you plan to attend the rally at 5pm on Thursday, October 26, in front of MUB on Ocean Campus. We are working hard to have conversations with every single faculty member at the college. Every voice counts.

In solidarity,
Mary Bravewoman, President AFT 2121

Posted in E-news Archives

Chancellor Martin is Refusing to Set Bargaining Dates with Faculty

Posted on September 8, 2023 by AFT 2121

Chancellor Martin is Refusing to Set Bargaining Dates with Faculty

City College is a gem of San Francisco’s public education system, and everyday we as faculty show up and work hard to serve our students and fulfill our mission. However:

For over two years, we have been without a raise, while living in a time of record inflation and in one of the most expensive regions in the country.
Full and Part Time faculty layoffs have led to the untenable overwork of Full Time faculty, many of whom are holding understaffed programs together. More competitive salaries and better staffing would help address this issue.
Despite all of these problems, we remain dedicated to our students and our mission. But the truth is we deserve better–Chancellor Martin owes us the respect of good faith negotiations for a fair contract and more competitive salaries right now.

Your AFT 2121 Bargaining Team is sorry to report that this is not happening. We have made multiple requests for new bargaining dates to continue negotiations for your new contract, and Chancellor Martin and his team are refusing to respond.

City College faculty cannot achieve a fair contract and more competitive salaries until Chancellor Martin decides to break his silence and show up for good faith negotiations with our AFT 2121 Bargaining Team. Talk to the AFT precinct representative and/or faculty organizer in your department about taking action to support the fight for your new contract. See here for a summary of negotiations so far.