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Chancellor Refuses CFA
Salary Proposal (9/16/06)
At 3:30 PM on September 15, 2006,
CFA's latest efforts to reach a salary settlement with the CSU came to
an end. Although the CSU administration had indicated that they had some
significant movement to offer, the bargaining team was disappointed to
discover that the administration had little to add to their previous
proposal. After consulting with the Chancellor, the CSU team announced
that they had offered all they were authorized to propose.
The administration's latest proposal
is based on the same Enron math as their previous one. Essentially, the
approach was to increase the length of the contract rather than the
quality of the economic offer.
After the administration shifted dollars around, the bottom-line that
faculty could count on only increased by 5.6%, and that would not arrive
in faculty pockets until the 2009/2010 academic year.
In the end the 9.25% over three years that faculty could rely on in the
last offer became 14.87% over four years in the new offer. In addition,
the 3% in "discretionary" money that would have been distributed over
two years would now be stretched over three. Furthermore, the serious
structural problems with compression for senior faculty and inversion
for junior faculty remained unaddressed.
As with their earlier offer, the administration demanded that all SSIs
be paid for from the General Salary Increase pool. As before, their
offer included a "virtual" 1% in the second, third and fourth years
contingent on additional allocations from the governor and on CFA's
unquestioning acceptance of the administration's future budget
proposals.
The facts surrounding CSU faculty salaries in recent years underscore
the inadequacies of this latest salary package. Having gone since 2002
without a GSI (except for a 3.5% increase last July that barely matched
inflation), all faculty need more than the 3% GSI the Chancellor is
offering this year. Faculty who were hired in 2003 and have not yet
received a single SSI symbolize the extreme needs of our newer faculty.
Although the Chancellor's offer was unacceptable, the CFA bargaining
team was determined to make every effort to reach a fair agreement. To
keep the process going, the CFA team offered to lower its proposal for a
first-year GSI from 4.5% to 4.0% in addition to an SSI and equity money.
The CFA team also added a fourth year to its economic proposal in an
attempt to elicit movement on the Chancellor's part and open the road to
a settlement.
Unfortunately, the Chancellor refused to budge. The administration's
team made clear that they lacked authorization to make any further
proposals. At this point it is likely that the parties will move into
impasse and begin the statutory process of mediation and fact-finding.
Reflecting on the end of this phase of negotiations, CFA President John
Travis commented, "The Chancellor's continued insensitivity to faculty
salary problems contrasts sharply with his efforts to champion the cause
of underpaid executives. It's galling for faculty to see that the next
Board of Trustees meeting will include yet another discussion of
executive compensation when we cannot reach an agreement on even a
modest GSI for faculty this year."
Considering where we go from here, Vice President Lillian Taiz
suggested, "Actions speak louder than words. We have told the Chancellor
and his team repeatedly that faculty are enraged at their inadequate
salaries, but Charlie obviously remains unmoved. From this point,
faculty actions will have to speak louder than words. Only action away
from the table will lead to action at the table."
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