Yale Bulletin and Calendar

February 28, 2003|Volume 31, Number 20

Unions declare intent to strike

Locals 34 and 35 of the Hotel Employees and Restaurant Employees (HERE) have called a strike against the University for March 3-7.

Local 34 represents 2,900 clerical and technical employees at Yale and Local 35 represents 1,100 service and maintenance workers.

The University said it would remain open and fully operational during any job action, and would implement its strike contingency plan to ensure that Yale's teaching, research and clinical missions continue with minimum inconvenience for students, faculty, and others.

HERE called for a strike after informing the University that it would not extend the existing contract with the University. Since January 2002, when the contract was scheduled to expire, the union and Yale had been agreeing to extend the contract on a month-by-month basis.

The Graduate Employees and Students Organization, which is affiliated with HERE and seeks to unionize graduate student teachers at Yale, also called a strike by its members for March 3-7.

Yale and HERE began negotiations on a new contract in February 2002.

Yale has proposed a six-year contract that would provide a cumulative average wage increase of 42% for clerical and technical employees and 22% for service and maintenance workers. Yale has also offered to increase the defined pension benefit by 11% to 18%, depending on an employee's salary.

Locals 34 and 35 are seeking four-year contracts with the University rather than six, and the two unions, which bargain together, have proposed larger raises and pension increases than Yale has offered over that period.

Other economic and non-economic issues also remain unresolved.

The unions have also proposed that the University agree in a contract to recognize any union that secures the signatures of a majority of the employees it seeks to represent. The University has informed HERE that it is opposed to recognition of a union through this process, called a "card count," and favors the process conducted by the National Labor Relations Board, which provides for a secret-ballot election by workers to decide if they wish to unionize.

The University has also noted that union recognition is not a mandatory subject of bargaining because it does not affect the terms and conditions of employment for the Yale workers in Locals 34 and 35. As such, the University has said it would not include union recognition among the issues to be negotiated in a new contract with Yale's existing unions.

Updated information on contract negotiations and the University's contract offer can be found at www.yale.edu/opa/labor.

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