CSUEU Chapter 322

CSU Employees not impacted by Governor's Furlough Order

Submitted by acoile on Thu, 07/29/2010 - 12:18pm

Short answer: The governor doesn't have the power to furlough CSU employees. Only the Chancellor can do it, and he can only do it after negotiating with the unions, and CSUEU has already said it would put it to a vote of the membership first.

Here's the full details:

http://www.calstate.edu/pa/News/2010/release/furlough-order.shtml
http://www.csueu.org/

acoile's blog

CSUEU's Endorsement

Submitted by acoile on Thu, 06/17/2010 - 10:41pm

Letter from CSUEU's statewide President Pat Gantt about the upcoming Special Election on Tuesday, June 22nd.

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CSUEU Board Endorses John Laird for State Senate

Submitted by acoile on Sat, 06/05/2010 - 6:58pm

In a conference call on Tuesday evening, the Board of Directors voted to endorse John Laird for the 15th District California State Senate (Central Coast) seat previously held by Republican Abel Maldonado, whom Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger named Lieutenant Governor late last year. The election takes place on June 22.

Laird, a Democrat originally from Vallejo, represented the 27th district (Santa Cruz/Monterey) in the California State Assembly until 2008 after running unopposed in the 2002 Democratic primary. During his tenure, he served as chair of both the Assembly Budget Committee, the Special Session Committee on Budget Process, the Judiciary Committee, the Labor and Employment Committee, and the Natural Resources Committee.

A Santa Cruz resident, he was one of the two first openly gay men to serve in the California legislature and was one of the first openly gay mayors in the U.S. in 1983, when he took over the mayoralty of Santa Cruz. During his time on the Santa Cruz City Council, 1981-1990, he led local governments in the fight against proposed offshore oil drilling. He graduated from Adlai Stevenson College at UC Santa Cruz in 1972 with an A.B. in Politics.

He’s a strong advocate of funding for higher education. “When I served in the Assembly, I represented one of the few districts that contained a higher education institution from all three public systems,” he says. “Whether in the budget or with legislation, I tried over six years to support the higher education system. Specifically, I have supported affordable fees for students and adequate financial support for the systems.”

He’s also expressed his support of expanded revenue streams to support higher education, including an oil and gas severance tax or similar measures.

For further details, visit Laird’s election web site, http://lairdforsenate.com/ .

No minimum wage for CSU workers

Submitted by acoile on Fri, 07/02/2010 - 11:34pm

From CSUEU President Pat Gantt:

Yesterday, Gov. Schwarzenegger made public an executive order that could temporarily reduce pay for more than 200,000 state workers to the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour. According to the union's preliminary review, the executive order does not apply to CSU staff or to other CSU employees.

Unlike many other state agencies, the CSU and other public higher education segments generally are not under the direct executive authority of the governor.

State Controller John Chiang, whose office issues state paychecks, released a statement Thursday saying that he won't follow the order unless a court tells him to. Today, the California Court of Appeal, looking at a similar executive order from 2008, held that Schwarzenegger had the authority to issue such an order. Again, to the best of our knowledge, these orders do not apply to CSU staff or to other CSU employees. Chiang can -- and likely will -- seek a review of the appellate court decision by the California Supreme Court in the coming days and weeks.

We are in contact with the California State University Chancellor's Office, and received an official response (see attachment), which says the CSU will not be cutting their paychecks.

For their part, members of the state legislature have adjourned for summer recess.

In Union,
Pat Gantt
Pat Gantt, President
CSUEU/SEIU Local 2579

Deadline for Fee Waiver: July 30, 2010

Submitted by acoile on Wed, 06/30/2010 - 11:01am

The deadline for participating in the Fee Waiver Program for the Fall 2010 semester at CSUMB is just around the corner. Please mark your calendar and submit your forms early to avoid any registration problems or late fees if you have not done so already.

More Layoffs at the Chancellor's Office

Submitted by acoile on Thu, 06/17/2010 - 1:14pm

We received word this morning that the Chancellor's Office is laying off 15 positions, in addition to the one they laid off a few months ago. Fourteen of the positions are in Unit 9, and one in Unit 7. They are predominantly IT-related positions. The layoffs won't take effect until September 15th, 2010.

CSUEU will immediately request to Meet & Confer to mitigate these layoffs. No layoffs are currently planned for CSU Monterey Bay.

I have been asked how many jobs have been saved by CSUEU. There's some number-crunching going on in Sacramento to come up with a definitive answer, but I know five jobs were saved at one campus, and all 45 reductions in timebase at Humboldt State were eliminated, at least for the moment, and more at some other campuses. In a time of layoffs, some people opt to retire, and others do a Voluntary Time Base Reduction to help out their co-workers, so the final total of people laid off is usually less than the number initially announced, and CSUEU works hard to get that number as low as possible (ideally, to zero).

New CalPERS rates for Health Coverage for 2011

Submitted by acoile on Thu, 06/17/2010 - 9:48am

CalPERS approved new rates for Health Insurance coverage today, 6/17.

acoile's blog

Board of Directors meeting

Submitted by acoile on Wed, 06/09/2010 - 3:06pm

As some of you may be aware, the next CSUEU Board of Directors meeting will be held at the Grand Sierra hotel in Reno, Nevada.

Some people are already trying to spin their own reasons why the Board is meeting in Reno:

There's a casino! They're gambling with your dues money.
It's a resort! They're going to lounge by the pool all day.

Here's the reality, for me, of our Board of Director's meetings:

Furloughs

Submitted by acoile on Wed, 06/09/2010 - 1:55pm

Just a couple quick reminders:

1. The current Furlough program expires June 30, 2010. The last campus furlough days (unless otherwise arranged by your supervisor) are this Friday, June 11th and Friday, June 25th. There are no further furlough days.

2. Because of the way our payroll cycles work, your JULY paycheck is actually for your time working in JUNE, so your July paycheck will still be down by 10.07% because of the unpaid Furlough days. Your AUGUST paycheck, which is actually for July (which will have no furlough days), will be the first paycheck back to 100%.

Let me know if you have any further questions.

Layoffs at Cal Poly Pomona

Submitted by acoile on Tue, 06/08/2010 - 4:44pm

We just received word that Cal Poly Pomona is laying off four CSUEU-represented employees. All four work in providing assistance to disabled students.

CSUEU will immediately request to Meet & Confer to mitigate these layoffs. No layoffs are currently planned for CSU Monterey Bay.

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