Hello fellow classified members. This is a long message and touches on several subjects.
See the link above for full details. Summary: you must decide if you are going to take it by April 2, 2018, and end your employment with the college by June 30th, 2018. Initially the college only wanted to offer the separation incentive to IT employees, but we were able to negotiate an option that opened it up to the members of the bargaining unit hired before Jan. 1, 2004. There is a higher cash amount offered to IT employees. This is the offer the college wanted to make. They would not offer the same to our non IT employees.
Annual Budget Development Update:
Administrative balancing proposals that would impact Classified Employees if implemented – For more details PLEASE attend the Budget Forum Today, March 15, 3-4:30pm, CML 103
- Cooperative Ed – Project Coordinator – Transfer to ASA
- Energy Management Program – move to grant funding, reassign Marketing Staff to Academic Technology
- Academic Progress Standards – .25 FTE of Administrative Specialist general fund eliminated. Reorg means no loss to employee FTE
- Child and Family Education – Administrative Coordinator – funding through fund IX
- Health and PE – Reorg, Project Coordinator – reassignment, Hourly part time eliminated, Wellness Program eliminated
- IT Efficiencies and Restructuring – Ideas are yet to be revealed
- Public Safety – Classified Hourly budget reduced, management is committed to 2 officers on duty at all times despite the reduction
- Music Dance and Theater – .5 Customer eliminated
- Institute for Sustainable Practices – Energy Analyst eliminated (employee has protected status)
- Project Specialist 2 – reassignment
Membership Drive:
You may have seen organizers around the campus as the drive is active this week and last week. We are getting out and talking to members, answering questions, collecting surveys, recommit cards, and new member forms. We have increased our member numbers by 71 since January 1, 2018! That is almost double the new members in the previous 2 years combined! Thank you to all of those who have volunteered! Although the membership drive will be over this week Union officers are available to come and speak to you if you have any questions about becoming a full union member. Please reach out to us via email at: lccef@lanecc.edu.
Bargaining Survey closes Friday, March 16, 2018:
At this point we have about 230 surveys collected. Once the survey closes the Survey Subcommittee of the Bargaining Team will compile all this data and assess it. We may want to submit a second survey based on our findings of the first survey.
Bargaining:
We have not opened Bargaining yet. We have agreed to join in Interest Based Bargaining training with the College. Those dates have not yet been determined but will likely happen in April. We have had one informal meeting with the college where they shared they would like us to consider OEBB medical insurance. This is the coverage the faculty have had since 2008. The faculty OEBB plans are on the HR website if you would like to look at them. We have formed an Insurance Subcommittee of the Bargaining Team to research this option. In addition to the Insurance and Survey Subcommittees we created a Communications Subcommittee of the Bargaining Team. It is this last group who will be creating the content for messages we send to you. It is our plan to send you email messages from lccef@lanecc.edu, post an electronic newsletter to our website lccef.org, and distribute hard copies of our newsletter. Please be patient as we develop these means of messaging you.
Class and Comp Study:
We had 235 PAQ submissions! A very good turn out!! Thank you to all those who participated. The Consultant received the bulk of these PAQ’s on Feb 23rd and a few more after that as they trickled in. It will take her about 6 weeks to assess all the PAQ’s and create job descriptions for them. Once done she will return the information to us. Each employee who submitted a PAQ will be shown the job description they have been placed in and determine if it fits their work. If not, the employee will get the opportunity to appeal. Once this part of the Study is complete the consultant will then do a market analysis of the job descriptions with colleges and businesses in Oregon. The final results are due to the college by June 30, 2018. The results will then need to be Bargained.
Grievance, Complaint, or Gripe?
As a classified employee you have certain rights but are you aware of what those rights are? Many employees mistakenly confuse a gripe or a complaint with a grievance. This brief article will attempt to explain the difference.
Grievance
A grievance is a violation of the Collective Bargaining Agreement (CBA) between CSEA and the district. The CBA is what is commonly referred to as “your contract.” A grievance is defined under the grievance article but generally is a denial of a specific section of the contract. For example, you would file a grievance if your supervisor refused to pay time and a half for overtime worked.
Complaint
A complaint is not a violation of the contract. Although an employee may believe that they are being treated unfairly, if there is no contractual violation, there is no grievance. A good example would be when two classified employees do not get along or have an argument. There is no contractual violation so a grievance cannot be filed. In these cases the employee must forward the complaint to their supervisor. LCC administration encourages employees to forward complaints, however the policy is not specific. If you have a complaint, speak to your supervisor. If you do not receive a satisfactory response, put your complaint in writing and forward it up the internal LCC administration chain. It is a good idea to include your Union at this point as well.
Gripe
What is a gripe? Many employees call me regarding what they believe are legitimate grievances when in fact they just have a gripe. A gripe is not a contractual violation and may not be a complaint. A gripe may be something that you believe is unfair or unjust but is not unlawful. For example, if your supervisor or co-worker “treats you differently” but that treatment does not rise to the level of discrimination. The best way to describe this is when two employees just don’t get along. There is nothing legal or contractual that mandates that employees like each other or become friends.
Should you have any questions or concerns about conditions of employment please contact a LCCEF Grievance Chair Dawn Rupp or LCCEF Officer as soon as possible.
In case you are curious about what your Union Leaders have been doing, see the bulleted examples of our first 72 days.
- Four Officers (Pat, Robin, Lesley & Rosa Maria) attended Winter School, American Federation of Teachers-Or (AFT-Or), Jan 19-21
- All six Officers (Pat, Robin, Dawn, Casandra, Lesley, Rosa Maria & Lisa) attended four separate training sessions by AFT-Or, Jan 22, 25, 29, Feb 1
- Two Officers (Pat & Robin) Classification and Compensation Study – on going
- Total of 37 Labor Management issues and investigations (21 completed, 16 active). Labor Management Team consists of all LCCEF Officers.
- Assessing and strategizing Governance Council and College Committee Classified Representation
- Updating our website lccef.org
- Reaching out to members to help/participate
- Held General Membership meetings, Feb 6, 2018, noon & 5:00pm
- Dividing work between Executive Council Officers
- Organize Google Team drive, and gathering files
- Creating, promoting and compiling a Bargaining Survey
- All Officers – on Bargaining Committee and some on Bargaining Team, including the 3 Bargaining Team Subcommittees (insurance, surveys, communications), check website
- Two Officers – (Pat & Robin) on the Annual Budget Development Subcommittee
- Two Officers – (Pat and Rosa Maria) on the College Vice President hiring committee
- Two Officers – (Dawn and Lisa) Egan Warming Center
- One Officer – (Lesley-co-chair) Math Dean hiring Committee
- Three Officers – (Pat, Robin (co-lead), Lesley) Continuous Process Improvement Group
- Three Officers – (Pat, Robin, Rosa Maria) Membership Drive
- One Officer – (Robin) liaison to Elections, 4 in one election active now
- Three Officers – (Pat, Robin, Rosa Maria) on Governance Councils
- All Officers – recruiting Members for various activities and projects
- One Officer – (Casandra) on Spring Conference Planning Committee
Rumors
Lastly, there have been several false rumors spread on campus about the current union leadership. To be clear none of the LCCEF Officers are having affairs, we are not white supremacists, and we are not trying to bust our Union. Quite the opposite. In the first 72 days of 2018 we have increased our membership numbers by 71 compared to 41 for all of 2017 and 6 for 2016. Please remember that rumors hurt people in very real ways. They can destroy relationships, end careers and divide organizations. The union leadership team has been working hard, building a collaborative team and reaching out to all our members. As colleagues, we hope that if you hear any rumors that you would come to us first rather than repeat them, and consequently create fear or anxiety among other members. We are more than happy to answer questions or concerns.
Sincerely,
President, Pat Griffin
Vice President, Robin Geyer
Grievance Chair, Dawn Rupp
Treasurer, Casandra Rhay
Recording Secretary, Lesley Stine
Corresponding Secretary, Rosa Maria Banuelos-Uribe
COPE Chair, Lisa Rupp