Throughout negotiations, summary reports will be added to the Negotiations page of this website for future reference.
Meeting #3
- We caucused for 15 minutes at the beginning of the session
- Formal negotiations began at 2:20.
- Regina announced that their team had brought a salary proposal.
- Mike told her to go ahead and pass it out
- Before she did so, she said she wanted to put it in context.
- She noted that she had discussed our proposal with the President and the Trustees and thought about it some more.
- She passed out two documents: One was an “equivalency table” of other Community College salary percentages; however, there were no names and there was no context provided. The second was a projection of the dollar amount payout by the College if the 20 most senior faculty were to retire today under our proposal to be reimbursed for sick time. Again, without context it was difficult to interpret the document.
- In sum, without context we did not find the “context” very helpful.
- She indicated that they wanted to stay with our rubric, but “bring it down” (salaries). Or “keep it proportional to revenue gains.”
- Regina passed out their compensation proposal and noted that there were two contingencies: they will not consider paying retirees for their sick time, and they insist that Deans set class size.
We broke to caucus at 2:33 p.m.; after examining the document and discussing it, we reconvened at 2:43.
- Mike stated that we still require more information from the Administration about our health insurance in order to consider their proposals.
- We asked for hard copies of the three plans.
- We asked for details on the 3-tier prescription plan:
- Specifically, we see the 3-tier prescription plan to be problematic because drugs can move from one tier to the next without warning, making it difficult for users to budget for. Mike asked if the savings on the prescription plan would be reflected in a decrease in our premiums. We were told, “Cost sharing is good for everyone.” So apparently not.
- Mike stated that in addition to the health insurance items we also needed the adjunct payroll breakdown.
We broke so the Administrative team could locate and/or generate documents. We caucused during this time. It was noted that the numbers in their offer are lower than the “equivalency table” of other community colleges they had provided.
We reconvened at 3:20
- Mike asked for clarification about their proposals. Regina was able to clarify a few things and will research the rest.
- Particularly, he asked her why they want to require new hires to teach online courses. She responded that “it is our growth area: it is where the students are, where the future is.”
- Mike told the Administrative Team that we would examine the Health Insurance information they provided. Next week we would like to come back with further rationale to provide understanding of our proposals.
- Finally, he asked Regina to dispense with bringing in comparative tables, as there are too many variables to make them meaningful. He reiterated that “We came up with fair figures. We think we can come to an agreement.”
Since next Wednesday is Renewal Day we agreed to meet earlier, from 1-3.
Adjourned at 3:40.
Respectfully submitted,
Suzanne V. Shepard, Ph.D.
Member, Faculty Association Negotiating Team
SUNY Broome Community College 