Expectations of labor-friendly incoming president strengthen faculty demands.
By Max Taves / Special to the Times
Negotiations between the Santa Monica College District and the Faculty Association, an independent union representing full- and part-time teachers, fell apart last week, leaving an ongoing dispute over a retroactive wage in limbo and stoking long-standing labor tensions.
The Faculty Association has demanded that teachers receive the same cost of living adjustment, or COLA, as administration and classified employees will receive. Classified employees are a category of workers that ranges from janitors to secretaries and are represented by the California School Employees Association, or CSEA.
In August, the district granted administration and classified workers a 2 percent COLA, retroactive for the 2004-2005 school year, and a 3.5 percent raise beginning last month. The district has offered faculty the same 3.5 percent increase, but not the 2 percent increase.
Union officials and administrators trace the source of this latest conflict to the state budget crisis that began in 2002. A hemorrhaging California budget meant financial panic for community colleges, including SMC. As a result of the crisis, when classified and administration employees’ contract expired in 2002, the district did not renew their contract. The faculty’s contract ended in 2003, which meant that teachers received a 2 percent cost of living adjustment that year.
SMC interim President Thomas Donner defended the district’s offer. In an interview with The Malibu Times, Donner said the school’s budget projections do not permit such an increase. He also said he worried that if faculty received the 2 percent COLA, then the CSEA would demand an increase to compensate classified employees for the adjustment that they missed in 2003.
While the college’s CSEA chapter has not taken an official position, union officials that spoke to The Malibu Times dismissed any such threat.
“Just about everyone [within the CSEA at SMC] would say that the faculty deserves an increase that would help them stay above inflation,” said one executive member of CSEA, who preferred to remain anonymous. “All factions within the union would say that. This is an expensive place to live.”
The Santa Monica College District is governed by a seven-member board of trustees. The internal deliberations of the board have been private and their reasons for not renewing a faculty contract are unknown.
Nancy Greenstein, chair of the board, was reluctant to speak about the district’s negotiations with the Faculty Association.
Preferring to speak as a member of the community rather than a board member, Greenstein said, “I want to settle the contract, and we certainly appreciate the role that faculty play here.”
While the board ultimately approves or rejects labor contracts, the president designs the school budget and counsels the board on how to vote. Union officials from the Faculty Association and the CSEA have frequently clashed with Donner and his predecessor, Piedad Robertson.
In a union vote taken in late November, faculty overwhelmingly rejected the district’s offer. Ninety-four percent opposed the contract, and there are few signs that faculty opposition will wane.
Union expectations of a more labor-friendly incoming president, Chui Tsang, have strengthened the Faculty Association’s resolve. Tsang is currently the president of San Jose City College.
“I spoke with leaders of the union [at SJCC], and I think he will be well liked by all the constituencies including the unions,” said Lantz Simpson, president of the Faculty Association.
Tsang did not respond to requests for an interview on the subject. His spokesperson, Bruce Smith, said, “He has not been involved and doesn’t really think he should get involved right now.”
When Tsang becomes president, he will inherit a legacy of bitter labor disputes. Throughout the 1990s, faculty and classified employees went years without contracts, and a deep mistrust of management developed. Union officials spoke of a heavy-handed leadership during former president Robertson’s 10-year tenure that sparked sharp conflict. One senior level administrator recalled, “Tension started the minute she was hired.”
In 2003, during the apex of labor conflict, faculty sent a symbolic message to Robertson when 86 percent of faculty sent her a vote of no confidence. Robertson left Santa Monica College in January of last year to assume a leadership position at nonprofit educational advocacy group.
Tsang will become president Feb. 27 and the spring semester begins February 13.