Chancellor, union leaders chat

  ANDREA KIM Coalition of University Employees and
University Professional and Technical Employee workers protest at
Westwood Plaza Friday. Union leaders later met informally with
Chancellor Albert Carnesale.

By Timothy Kudo
Daily Bruin Senior Staff

Union organizers met informally with a sympathetic chancellor on
Friday after leading a protest from Westwood Plaza to the Faculty
Center.

Organizers, who criticized Chancellor Albert Carnesale in the
past for his reluctance to meet with them, celebrated the first
meeting with him since he became head of UCLA.

In the meeting, Carnesale expressed his support for some of the
unions’ causes.

“That’s the closest we’ve ever gotten in terms
of public support from the chancellor,” said Claudia Horning,
president for the Coalition of University Employees.

CUE and University Professional and Technical Employee union
organizers are considering striking if they don’t arrive at a
contract soon.

The UPTE technical unit, consisting of lab assistants, lab
mechanicians, computer operators and other employees, will walk out
and protest in other ways during the next couple of weeks,
organizers said.

At the end of the approximately 75 person march, the two union
leaders broke off for the meeting in the chancellor’s Murphy
Hall office.

Because neither party was authorized to bargain on behalf of
their organizations, the informal meeting let organizers plead with
the chancellor to use his “bully pulpit” and exert
influence in the UC in favor of a good contract for the unions.

“One thing I learned is never make a proposal that’s
not in your authority to accept,” Carnesale said. “But
I do support a fair resolution and I think a fair resolution is not
the status quo.”

The meeting was cordial as the organizers thanked the chancellor
for meeting with them and abandoned the forceful chants of the
protest for a more pleading tone.

But at times, the two sides jabbed at each other politely, as
when the organizers congratulated the chancellor on his recent pay
raise. Likewise, the chancellor responded to suggestions that the
university was hardnosed at the bargaining table by saying,
“It does take two to sign a contract.”

Union organizers said they appreciated the public stance taken
by the chancellor but hoped that action would follow his words.

CUE is currently in the second year of bargaining for their
first contract and UPTE is also in negotiations for a contract that
expired

Sept. 4.

“We’re going to make the chancellor’s life
miserable until they give us a contract,” said Cliff Fried,
an UPTE organizer.

But some CUE members are upset with the lengthy
negotiations.

“I don’t understand how people can let this happen
for two years,” said Pam Blair, a CUE member and employee in
fleet and transit services.

Some of the employees, including Blair, were calling for a walk
out at the protest.

Horning defended her decisions regarding the union by noting how
much the labor movement changed in the past couple years.

“Maybe we should have struck two years ago, but if we did
we would have had four people with picket signs outside of
campus,” she said.

In UC contracts there is a no-strike clause that prevents
workers from walking out while their contract is still in effect.
Because CUE has no contract,there is nothing legally preventing
them from striking.

According to CUE figures, the university underpays clerical
employees the union represents by as much as 20 percent when
compared with figures on similar jobs in surrounding areas.

UC figures also show that clerical workers are underpaid.

This has been a major rallying point for CUE employees who say
they work for free on Fridays because of the pay differential.

In the wake of recent raises of the UC chancellors, some of the
employees were upset about the university’s commitment to
equaling the pay discrepancy.

“There was a group, they organized and they got a pay
raise,” Horning said. “Who am I talking about? The
chancellors.”

Students also supported the protest, including fourth-year
sociology student Joanna Vaker of UC Irvine who came to protest as
a part of the group Youth for Socialist Action.

“We always support the labor issues,” she said.

The UCLA labor movement recently garnered increased support from
students. During the past year, some of those supporters went on to
continue working with the unions as organizers after
graduation.

“I think students are such a big part of making
change,” Vaker said.