Last Friday, September 29, we held another bargaining session with the University System of Maryland (USM) at our AFSCME Maryland Union Hall in Baltimore.
Early on in this process, our AFSCME bargaining team provided multiple comprehensive proposals, covering a range of issues, including pay, leave, the use of contractual employees, and more. But in this last year, the USM team has still failed to provide any kind of concrete response or counter to our proposals. Instead, they showed up on Friday with a list of what they deemed to be the ten costliest items in our proposals. The AFSCME bargaining team did our own calculations and found some of the USM’s calculations to be miscalculated and overinflated. We demanded that the USM management team provide a full response to our proposals, and they agreed to provide a comprehensive counter proposal at our next bargaining session on Tuesday, October 17. After some discussion, we did adjust our proposals for childcare and steward leave, two items included in the list of costliest proposals.
Throughout this process, the USM has continued to push back on our efforts to bargain under a unified contract, going directly against the intent of SB 9, which won us the right to bargain a single contract. The USM continues to attempt to alter the definition of the term “employer” in our contract negotiations to shift responsibility away from themselves and back onto the individual schools. We are continuing to push back to ensure all workers across the entire university system are treated fairly and that workplace rights, policies, and standards are consistent across the state.
If the USM continues to play games, we will head to an impasse. In that case, a third party would review our case to determine a fair settlement. In the current system, however, the third party’s ruling would be non-binding, and would then go to the Governor and leaders of the General Assembly to review. Instances like this are a clear example of why we need binding arbitration for those of us who work in higher education to help hold management accountable to bargaining in good faith. In this upcoming legislative session, passing a law enabling binding arbitration for higher education workers will be a top priority, and more information will come about how you can show your support and act in Annapolis.
Warren Pointer, an Electronics Technician at the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland at College Park and a member of the AFSCME Higher Education Bargaining Team, shared his experience within the USM and how being a part of our union has played a role.
“I’ve been with UMD for over 20 years, and I’ve witnessed a significant improvement in our work environment thanks to our union. The COVID-19 pandemic actually highlighted the importance of our union because it revealed the disparity between how management and employees were treated. Management themselves chose to work remotely while requiring the rest of us to be on-site without understanding the risks involved.
My journey with the union began after receiving an unsatisfactory review from management, which they couldn’t explain. I soon discovered that some non-exempt colleagues were deliberately getting poor reviews from their managers to prevent pay increases. Since then, I’ve been a shop steward with AFSCME, and we’ve revamped the pay structure to reduce such issues.
Being part of the bargaining team has taught me the value of our union in challenging management’s reluctance to respect worker rights. We’re tackling critical issues, like pay raise structures and workload, which has become a major concern due to staff reductions in our department. Since the pandemic, the number of staff in my department has been cut in half resulting in stressful workloads for the rest of us that are still here. And before our last agreement, there had been no wage hikes for five years.
To my coworkers not yet in the union, I urge you to join us. There’s strength in numbers, and together, we can negotiate for better working conditions and ensure our victories continue.”
Our next bargaining session will be Tuesday, October 17 at the Maryland Fire and Rescue Institute at the University of Maryland College Park.