Negotiations Summary Report #2 – April 22, 2015

Throughout negotiations, summary reports will be added to the Negotiations page of this website for future reference.

Meeting #2

1. We caucused for 15 minutes at the beginning of the session
2. Formal negotiations began at 4:15.
3. Mike informed Regina that we would need the first 15 minutes of each Negotiating Session to get organized. Regina agreed.
4. Regina stated her goals for the day:
   1. Stated that her team plans to work from our proposal.
   2. Says they want to understand the “underpinnings” of our proposal.
   3. Indicated that they were comparing it to other community colleges to see what others are doing.
   4. Suggested that some of our requests could be covered in other venues (ex. hang tags).
5. Mike responded:
   1. Acknowledged that there are a few items being discussed in other venues, but that we did not want the opportunity for resolution to be missed.
   2. Stated, “We appreciate you are OK with some of these things but we need contract language for the next person.” (Regina noted that they are just good business sense. Mike reiterated that we still need them in writing.)
   3. Indicated that we can’t figure out their spreadsheets. We need breakouts for the adjuncts (part time as well as full time) and overload. Regina agreed to get that to us.
   4. Asked if we were going to get a more detailed proposal from them; Regina responded, “We have yours as a starting point.” Mike asked, “But will we be getting something more specific?” Regina responded, “We’ll have something for you.”
6. Regina then proceeded to hand out a series of documents to, in her words, “provide context for our negotiations.” These included things like takeaways from the State Budget, enrollment analysis, and the fund balance. She also included a comparison of other NYS Community College salaries. As expected, the point of these documents was to indicate that they could not give us the raises we have proposed.
7.  Discussion ensued
   1. Mike responded by stating that regardless of ranking, etc., our proposal is legitimate. It is based on predictability and fairness. Our people are rooted here, and that should mean something.
   2. Regina agreed that the College wants to retain its faculty. She stated that they are open to other ways to get to our goals. She added that, “We all agree to no more leapfrogging.”
8.  At this point we broke and caucused.

We reconvened at 3:20.

1. Regina says that we have a lot we can work with “in the middle.” She added that she would have to talk to the President and the Board. She asked for clarification about a couple of items and received it.
2. Regina doesn’t like the sick time payable on retirement item. She said, “One faculty member is $250,000. It will break the college to do this!!”
3. She also doesn’t like the 4.4% across the board raises. She says, “No college is settling at this range! She says she has heard from 10 colleges. One is at 3% and 2 is ‘typical.’” Mike responded, “When were they agreed to? They are most likely contracts that are still playing out from previous negotiations.” Regina responded, “ESPA has agreed to tie their raises to enrollment.” Mike responded, “That is a terrible contract!”
4. Regina stated that our proposal is a good place to begin negotiating from; she acknowledged that it is carefully crafted.

The meeting concluded at 3:50. We will reconvene negotiations in 3 weeks: May 13 and 20.

Respectfully submitted,
Suzanne V. Shepard, Ph.D.
Member, Faculty Association Negotiating Team