HPAE United at Rutgers Local 5094 Bargaining update – July 15, 2022

Bargaining Update for Rutgers University: July 15, 2022, and we still do not have a contract

HPAE local 5094 met on 7/15/22 for our sixth session of negotiations with Rutgers University. Our contract expired July 1, 2022.

It is now more important than ever to get involved and support your negotiations team. We need to you to collectively show Rutgers you stand behind our team. Click the link to sign the petition and show solidarity with your negotiations team.

https://actionnetwork.org/petitions/hpae-5089-and-5094-at-rutgers-university-we-call-on-rutgers-to-bargain-with-us-in-good-faith/

Negotiations have finally started! At our session on 7/15, we received counter proposals from Rutgers that shows an interest moving this contract forward, but we still have a long way to go. Rutgers has yet to provide us with responses to the outstanding information request and has not responded to any financial proposals.

Below is a list of the contract items negotiated at this session:

1. Rutgers has acknowledged their responsibilities under the Workplace Democracy Enhancement Act to include per diem employees in our HPAE job titles in the contract. Your union co-president, Justin O’Hea has been negotiating with Rutgers since before the pandemic to include this group of workers in the contract with the rights and benefits of all union employees. We still have a lot of work to do in defining the parameters of the wages, increases, and other benefits of the contract but this is a great start.
2. Part time employee definitions in the contract will be updated to include all those in regular part time positions throughout the bargaining unit.
3. The University officially acknowledges Juneteenth on the holiday calendar and responded to our proposal on the same. Currently the University is rejecting our proposal to add Election Day as a formal holiday on the calendar. We will continue to negotiate over that holiday.
4. Our negotiations team recognizes the unique work our bargaining unit members perform and presented a proposal on Preceptor Pay (differential pay for those providing training to new staff in orientation). The University rejected this proposal stating it was not applicable to our bargaining unit. Prior to responding to the University, we will be sending out a survey in the beginning of next week to poll the membership on the applicability of this language in broad strokes in the bargaining unit.
5. Rutgers acknowledged the delay in salary adjustments, reclassifications, and equity reviews in the session today. They rejected our proposal demanding grievance rights for Compensation Services decisions and a more detailed process to streamline decisions. After filing a class action grievance and subsequent arbitration, the University has finally stated all outstanding requests would be completed by August 1^st.

We provided a response to the grievance proposal Rutgers presented in our session on 6/28/22. We made it very clear to the University our union has no interest in decreasing the benefits covered by our contract for rights to representation, access to the grievance procedure, and holding front line management accountable when attempting to issue disciplines. We countered their proposal stating our current contract language was sufficient.

We used the negotiations as an opportunity to address the parking pass issue with our new OIT group. Currently our new OIT negotiations unit employees have struggled to renew their parking passes as their status has been classified as RBHS preventing them from securing a parking pass to come to work.

Our next virtual session is scheduled for Tuesday, July 19 at 1pm. We continue to have a strong showing from our general membership, and we encourage everyone to continue to attend when possible. We are meeting as a caucus prior to the session at 12:30pm and are inviting all members in good standing to attend. Please register for the pre-meeting at this link.

https://aft.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJwvd-2oqz4oH9C906QTaM4cQNGXvfgMpVGK

You should not be on work time during your attendance at the session. We are asking for a commitment of 1 hour to show Rutgers we stand behind our committee in solidarity. You can use either your personal or Rutgers device to log into the sessions.

In Solidarity,

HPAE 5094 Negotiations Committee – Justin O’Hea, Ryan Novosielski, Ana Delgado, Philip Wilson, Fatima Meadows, Jennifer Hunt, Kerry Butch, Christina Rozario, Dana LaClair, Charles Jackson, Saleena Ghanny, Susan Fenker, Robin Covington, Isabel Arroyo, and Mayra Barreto