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UPI: UIS support staff not respected by U of I
By Tom Cronin
Union leaders, who recently
requested a federal mediator in contract negotiations with UIS,
came to last Thursday’s meeting of the university’s Board of
Trustees with a message: the UIS support staff deserves respect.
Normajean Niebur, UIS Chapter
President of University Professionals of Illinois Local 4100,
read a statement to the board that addressed her concerns about
reductions in the work force, distress caused by the Banner
system, and the university’s lack of recognition for the
necessity of support staff employees.
“I feel the board refuses to
acknowledge the importance of the work of the UIS support staff,
and has put the entire mission of the university in jeopardy,”
her statement read. “So long as we do not receive the respect
and attention we deserve, students, faculty, and the state of
Illinois will suffer.”
Representatives from the
Illinois Federation of Teachers and its affiliate UPI had
planned to picket Thursday’s board meeting, but they scrapped
their plans after learning that opponents of Chief Illiniwek
would also be protesting, IFT Field Service Director Dave Kamper
said.
According to Kamper, support
staff employees at UIS are currently earning anywhere between 10
and 40 percent less than their colleagues at UIUC for doing the
same work. Equal pay for equal work is an issue of respect, he
said.
“Respect means you look at these
people who are cleaning the buildings, who are serving the food,
who are running … the academic departments,” Kamper said. “And
you look at those folks and you say: these are people who
matter, whose work matters, who have expertise and knowledge
that matters, and that their input into the way this university
functions will make the university a better place for everybody.
“And instead,…the Board of
Trustees and the provost and the chancellor here look at the
support staff, and they see disposable parts.”
UIS Public Relations Director
Cheryl Peck said that UIS administrators agree with academic
professional staff and civil service staff members who are
requesting salary equity. However, UIS does not have enough
money in the budget to correct salary inequities because of
reductions in state funding from the last three years, she said.
Campus administrators are
working with “appropriate groups” to address issues raised in
recent salary-equity studies of the campus, Peck said.
Kamper, however, said that the
university’s budget is a political document that reflects the
priorities of the institution. The U of I has shown that the
support staff at UIS is not a priority by not budgeting for
equitable salaries and raises, he said.
According to Kamper, the net pay
– or pay adjusted for inflation – of the UIS support staff has
declined by about 10 percent over the last five years. Niebur
said that some vacated positions have not been filled, leaving
many employees overworked.
“Every single one of our
employees is directly contributing to the teaching, research and
service missions of the university,” Kamper said. “There is no
fat on the bone here. We support the university’s efforts to cut
needless bureaucracy. Our employees don’t fit that category. The
people we represent, every single one of them is working every
minute of the day doing essential functions. If any of them lost
their jobs, something wouldn’t get done on this campus that
needs to get done.”
Union leaders requested a
federal mediator on Aug. 31 to settle negotiations with the
university over a new contract. The previous contract expired on
Aug. 28, about seven months after both parties agreed to it.
Niebur said that the union is
waiting for an appointment to be scheduled to begin negotiations
involving the mediator.
According to an article printed
in the State Journal-Register on Sept. 1, a university contract
proposal offered UPI members 2 percent raises for the first year
of the contract, followed by no raises the next two years.
Peck said that the SJ-R’s
information regarding the last two years of the contract offer
is inaccurate. For fiscal years 2006 and 2007, the UIS proposal
offered raises equivalent to the state funding set aside for
raises those years or the campus salary increase program,
whichever is greater, she said.
Niebur described the
university’s offer as “ludicrous” and said that a 2 percent
raise is nothing.
“If you’re making $180,000 a
year, 2 percent is a lot,” she said. “When you’re making what
support staff on this campus is making, 2 percent is nothing. It
will be eaten up next July with health benefit raises, which are
going to go up again.”
UPI leaders are willing to
bargain and are confident that they will receive a fair
three-year contract “one way or another,” Niebur said.
According to Peck, UIS
administrators hope to reach a “mutually satisfactory agreement”
with the union as soon as possible.
UPI is the largest of five
unions at UIS, representing about 150 service, technology and
clerical workers. The union is affiliated with the IFT, which
represents about 95,000 K-12 teachers, support staff employees,
higher education professionals and other educational
professionals from across Illinois.
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