
Issue # 47: June 29, 2023
Update from the President
Frankie Cocanour
Appointments To Councils:
It’s that time of year where we need to make appointments to councils. If you are a union appointee to a council and would like to continue with your work please let me know so that I can reappoint you. If you are interested in a committee or council and would like a union appointment, please let me know. Here is the list that I have where we need appointments made.
Diversity Council – 2 appointments
Infrastructure Council – 2 appointments left
Student Success – 2 appointments left
Bargaining:
We went over Article 4 during the bargaining session. Article 4 deals with union representation. One of the things that we asked for is more release hours for union officers. We want to make sure that we are setting up all future officers with enough hours to get all of their work done. The rest of the article deals with access to represent our members. We mostly fixed grammar and typos. We restructured a few sentences to make the contract read better.
This bargaining session I observed due to getting over an illness on not wanting to take a chance of sharing (In this case, sharing was not caring). I am glad I did this because I realized that it’s difficult to follow along with the discussion when you don’t have the article to follow along with as you listen to both sides go back and forth. We will be sending out a link to the articles that we will be discussing prior to bargaining. This should make it a better experience for everyone who is observing.
At the end of bargaining sessions when we have time leftover after the college leaves or in the case when the bargaining session was canceled we have held impromptu town hall sessions. These have been something that the bargaining team has enjoyed and found very helpful. We are working on setting up a bargaining town hall in the next couple weeks. We want to schedule it directly after a bargaining meeting where the new CP of Finance Sue Fahey will be discussing this next year’s budget. We will send out an invitation as soon as we have the date scheduled. We want to be sure that we can all have a good discussion on the information that is presented. As you are aware the budget presented to the board and the information that was given to the Board of Education at their work session last week was not great and the bargaining team wants to hear from our members before we start bargaining anything fiscally related. We will also send out a survey to dues paying union members after our town hall meeting. If you are not a current dues paying member and would like to be able to take the survey please contact Skye Nguyen and she can assist you.
New Grievance Officer:
Claudia Riumallo has volunteered to be our next Grievance Officer! We are very excited about this. I have worked with Claudia previously when she was our Membership officer and I can say that she is one of the most caring and compassionate people on this campus. We will have a Grievance committee working with her on grievance and labor issues.
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Announcements and Reminders
We’re announcing the Grievance Committee. The Committee Chair is Claudia Riumallo and rounding out the committee is Frankie Cocanour, Buck Potter, Linda Rieling, Miche Drieling and Coin Vurek. You can contact anyone on the committee for assistance. Please remember to ask the union for representation if a meeting with your manager is disciplinary. You also have the right to stop any meeting and request a union representative if you were not told the meeting was disciplinary in nature.
DON’T FORGET TO WEAR RED ON WEDNESDAYS!

Newsletter Feedback
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WERE YOU LAID OFF AND HAVE SINCE RETURNED TO LCC? We’d like to hear from you. Please reach out to me at: colinlccef@gmail.com so I can hear your story.
Vice President of Labor Relations
Buck Potter (2022-2023 Term)
Vice President of Organizing
Colin Vurek (2023-2024 Term)
Greetings members,
BARGAINING CONTINUES Tuesday, July 11, 2023 AT 11:00AM!
Members are welcomed to observe via Zoom with your microphones and cameras OFF, please. I will be running a Slack Chat to allow observers to chat with me and I can pass ideas to the team at the table. I will actually be at the table also but bouncing into the chat to answer questions you may have. Email me your private email address to: colinlccef@ gmail.com so I can add you to the Slack chat. There is also a link below for anyone to RSVP on a Google form. You will find the link for the bargaining meeting below:
Join Zoom Meeting https://lanecc.zoom.us/j/96183623044
Meeting ID: 961 8362 3044
One tap mobile
+13462487799,,96183623044# US (Houston)
Dial by your location
+1 669 900 6833 US (San Jose)
Feel free to use the image below as your Zoom background.

IF YOU’D LIKE TO RSVP TO BE SURE I GET YOU IN OUR BARGAINING CHAT PLEASE USE THE FORM BELOW:
RSVP to be added to Slack Chat during bargaining
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THE NEW T-SHIRTS HAVE ARRIVED. WE HAVE PLENTY OF EVERY SIZE. Please email me at colinlccef@gmail.com to get yours!
I also have window clings and stickers for you to flaunt your support for your union! See below!

DON’T FORGET TO WEAR RED ON WEDNESDAYS!
UNION STRONG!
Grievance Officer
Claudia Riumallo (2023-2024 Term)
Treasurer
Linda Reling (2022-2023 Term)
Happy Thriday! I am so grateful for the brilliant union members that bargained these long summer weekends for us. 🙂 We have some big shoes to fill.
Records Officer
Tracy Weimer (2022-2024 Term)
Communications Officer
Marleena Pearson (2022-2023 Term)
I was able to escape for a couple days in a location almost entirely off the cell service grid, and it was really nice to reset a bit (aside from the mosquitoes!). I am playing catch up and am very excited for the Grievance Committee. Our union is a lot of work, and the more people we can have to step up to take a little bit here and there, the stronger we become and less burnout.
Is there an area of the union that interests you, but maybe you are overwhelmed by the full EC position? Contact us! We have lots of smaller tasks or easy ways you can help out.
Membership Officer
Skye Nguyen (2022-2023 Term)
Happy Thriday everyone! Busy as usual with bargaining but it’s great to see everyone at the bargain sessions every other Tuesday! This last week we got some good info and feedback from all of you! Looking forward to more of this hopefully. Everyone have a good weekend!
Finally, if anyone ever wants to chat about how they can get involved with the union just tag me! 🙂
If there are any questions about membership or someone has interest in joining, they can reach out to me (membership@lccef.org) or fill out the online membership form!
Your Benefit Info of the Week
Did you know that members get some really useful benefits? This week we are highlighting travel benefits. Save potentially hundreds on tours around the different regions of the world. Get out and take some time for yourself! Not in a vacation mood? Don’t forget to take some personal time, our health is the most important thing we have so we should give it a break!
Find out what other benefits you are qualified for as union members by going to AFT.org.
Resources you may need!
- How to update your physical address on Expresslane.
- Complete this form for a Membership card or a new membership card! If you are a new member, one may have already been requested, contact the LCCEF Membership Officer for info.
Submit an Important Life Event for you or another member may have coming up.
Chief Labor Delegate
Mark Jordan (2022-2023 Term)
COPE Officer
Fiora Starchild-Wolf (2022-2023 Term)
Hi Everyone! I’m finally back!
As your Political Officer, even as I took a once in a lifetime trip around Europe, I was paying attention to politics and history and how they all interact.
-For example, Berlin Germany, where my kiddo just graduated from an MFA program, has been managing a huge influx of refugees from Ukraine, which means their Immigration office is swamped, employment and housing are problematic at the moment, etc. This naturally affects politics, but in Germany, what I saw and felt was that the people are mostly sympathetic and doing their best to allow for refugees to receive what they need.
-We traveled to Prague, where we learned much about the history of the Bohemians, and the development of nation-states, and the Czech people in the 9th century, through the 20th century, from the Christianization of Bohemia through the fall of the Iron Curtain. Because Prague was never bombed during World War II, the history of all of this is right in front of someone walking the streets, as nothing has been destroyed.
– In London, we visited the National Transportation Museum, and learned of the fascinating politics of how a small city on the Thames, full of muddy streets and horse drawn carriages, became the first city to have public transportation–from carriages, to steam and then electric buses, to the first Underground subways.
The world is a fascinating place, and if you ever get the chance, go explore!
Today’s Political News:
In this space, though there is always plenty going on in the world of US politics, I try to focus on education related news.
The US Supreme Court yesterday handed down a decision on the University of North Carolina’s use of Affirmative Action, that basically overturns and ends Affirmative Action as we know it today. ABC News: Supreme Court affirmative action decision could impact racial equity in higher ed
The decision essentially says that universities may no longer include race as a factor in their admissions decisions or other eligibility factors. Until now, Affirmative Action has essentially been used by universities and sometimes other institutions, when all other factors are equal, to favor a student from a racial minority in order to both “level the playing field” for access for less privileged students, and to also help a university to have a more diverse student population. The Supreme Court’s conservative majority voted to end that practice.
I am not certain how this may impact community colleges, but watch for information going forward.
In other news, and in honor of Pride month, last night I saw an interview with Katie Rinderle, a Georgia teacher who is the first to be fired under a law that the Governor passed last year, outlawing any educational materials that contain “divisive concepts”.
Here is anews story from about it
Essentially, Katie Rinderle, who teaches grade school gifted students, purchased the book “My Shadow is Purple” at her school’s own Scholastic Books fair in her own school’s library. Periodically, she has a practice of allowing her students to choose a book from her classroom selection that she will read aloud and they will all discuss. Her students voted for this book. It is very mild–not pushing any agenda, but basically saying that certain character traits and feelings that are sometimes assigned as “feminine” or “masculine” might be attributed to anyone. (As in, my own history as being one of the few women engineering students at Purdue in the 80’s).
A student told their parent about the book, and the parent contacted the school, and Ms. Rinderle was placed on leave, and has now apparently been fired.
These kinds of things affect us all. No matter what our personal beliefs, we need to continually watch and protect against discrimination of those who are targeted or less likely to be treated as equals in our community at Lane.
Officer At Large
Katie Neall (2023-2024 Term)

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