CSUEU E-News: September 22, 2011
Biweekly news digest from the California State University Employees Union
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CSUEU OFFICERS SPEAK AT THIS WEEK’S CSU BOT
BE WARY OF SIGNATURE GATHERERS ON YOUR CAMPUS
FEDS PAY PREMIUM FEES TO PRIVATE CONTRACTORS
COMMUNICATIONS COMMITTEE SEEKS PHOTOS
CONNECT WITH CSUEU VIA SOCIAL MEDIA
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CSUEU Officers Speak at CSU Board of Trustees Meeting
In comments to the CSU Board of Directors at its meeting in Long Beach over the last two days, September 20-21, CSUEU President Pat Gantt pointedly noted that the CSU’s custom of giving salary boosts to higher management for expanded duties must be extended to rank and file employees, who are constantly dealing with workload issues.
“There is not one person in the CSU who has not seen a workload increase over the last few years,” he stated. “I would like to see the same compensation philosophy applied to the rank and file employees and in their contracts.”
He also addressed the selection process for new campus presidents and the need for candidates to make campus visits; the trustees ultimately voted to make such visits optional instead of mandatory.
He ended by recounting figures from a recent California Budget Project backgrounder: state spending on corrections rose from $604.2 million in 1980-81 to $9.6 billion in 2010-11, a nearly 1,500 percent increase that significantly outpaced the growth of total state General Fund spending during the same period. As a result, state spending on corrections has more than tripled as a share of General Fund expenditures, rising from 2.9 percent in 1980-81 to 10.5 percent in 2010-1. He emphasized that the 1,500 percent increase in state funding for corrections since 1980 has been primarily at the expense of higher education and asked, “What would the CSU look like if our funding increased by 1500 percent since 1980?”
VP for Representation Russell Kilday-Hicks provided an overview of contract bargaining that emphasized the CSU’s failure to present all of its proposals before the contract expired on June 30, which he termed unprofessional and unnecessary. Read his full comments.
Yesterday morning, the board’s Finance Committee provided a preliminary overview of the CSU’s funding request for the 2012-13 academic year. The plan represents about an 8.25 percent year-over-year increase, but it is only a partial recovery from the cuts that the system has taken in recent years.
CSU officials mentioned that they are asking for what the system needs but do not expect full funding; instead, they are using this request to document ongoing needs as a way of educating the legislature on the system's finances. Pat Gantt points out that this applies in particular to the request for a 3 percent compensation increase pool.
Overall, the CSU has identified $300+ million in needed ongoing revenue increases, including:
- Enrollment growth (5 percent) $100 million
- Compensation increase (3 percent “pool”) $95 million
- Mandatory costs (health/dental benefits, energy $50 million
- Graduation Initiative/Student Success $40 million
- Urgent maintenance needs $15 million
- Information technology infrastructure upgrade/renewal $15 million
The CSU faces an additional mid-year cut of up to $100 million--on top of an already-enacted cut of $650 million--if state revenue forecasts are not met. This would reduce CSU state funding to $2 billion, or a year-over-year reduction of 27 percent in state support.
Be Wary of Signature Gatherers on Your Campus
The season has arrived for signature gatherers to haunt campuses, shopping malls, and other public places, trying to qualify often dangerous ballot initiatives for next year’s election cycle. Sponsors have until late October to gather the required hundreds of thousands of valid signatures per measure.
The best advice for one and all: Don’t sign anything!
These signature gatherers, who often get paid by the signature, will say just about anything to make their proposed ballot initiatives seem attractive. But, behind their seductive sales pitches are measures that can impact our right to bargain collectively and to have a decent retirement, among other injustices. Here are just a few of the initiatives in the works:
- The “Stop Special Interest Money Now Act” would make it purposely more difficult for unions to gather and spend voluntary political contributions. Signature gatherers are concentrating on conservative areas of the state for this one.
- The “End Public Sector Bargaining Act” would prohibit state and local public agencies from recognizing any labor union or other employee association as a bargaining agent of any public employee.
- The “Costa-Matteoli Pension Solvency Act” would put severe limits on public worker retirement plans.
- The “Raise Public Retirement Ages Act” increases the minimum retirement age to 65 for CalPERS members.
You can make sure these initiatives and so many others like them are DOA, if you just DSA: Don’t sign anything!
Federal Government Pays Premium Fees to Private Contractors
A new report finds the federal government pays more than twice as much to private contractors as it would cost federal workers to perform the same work. A study just published by the Project on Government Oversight pretty much blows up the argument that most government should be privatized because workers are overpaid with far too generous benefits.
According to the study, titled “Bad Business: Billions of Taxpayer Dollars Wasted on Hiring Contractors,” the government spends some $320 billion a year for services by private contractors.
Groups opposing federal workers cooked the books and used incomplete information—comparing salaries but not including benefits and other costs—in their studies comparing costs.
POGO General Counsel Scott Amey recently told The New York Times, “We compared the full compensation paid to federal government and private-sector employees to the billable rates in federal service contracts. Across the board you see that it cost government more to pay for contractors.”
Communications Committee Seeks Photos from Each Chapter
If your chapter hasn’t yet sent a group e-board shot and some activity photos for the 2012 calendar, now is the time to do so.
As reported in the August 11 edition of E-News, the Communications Committee would like to feature one group photo from each chapter as well as activist and member photos in the upcoming calendar. Ideally, photos will show chapter officers and other activists at meetings, rallies, information activities, or other chapter activities. The idea is to show chapter activists whom the members at the chapters will recognize. Two chapters will be featured for each month. Each featured photo will be captioned with the chapter number and campus.
This is a statewide unity concept, and the committee wants every chapter to be involved. In order for this idea to work, chapters need to submit several high-resolution photos (up to 300 dpi) to Communications Committee Chair Ray Finnell or Communications Officer John Watson by September 15.
Please celebrate your chapter’s part in CSUEU by contributing to this project!
Connect with CSUEU on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter
It’s easier than ever to connect with CSUEU, since the union has a presence on three of the most popular social networking sites—Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.
On Facebook, where we’re listed as the “CSU Employees Union,” you can find photos, videos and links to relevant articles. More than 165 followers have “liked” us. Please join them!
On YouTube, uploaded and favorited videos and slide shows are available, covering rallies, protests and other actions over the last couple of years.
By following us on Twitter, you’ll be the first to know whenever pertinent items are posted to the web, since you’ll get a tweet as soon as new items are available. Over 170 people have subscribed so far, and the number keeps growing.
Links to all three sites can be found at the bottom of all pages at the CSUEU web site, www.csueu.org.
For the last two years, chapter stewards and other leaders have been able to discuss union issues via special forums on the Activist, a secure web site specially created as a resource for CSUEU activists. If you’re a steward, log in and join the discussion! If you have questions about your account, contact John Watson for assistance.
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See back issues of CSUEU E-News, distributed every other Thursday.
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