On Friday, FFAP members and labor leaders from across Portland and around Oregon joined us at the table to show solidarity with our union – including leaders from AFT-Oregon, PSU-AAUP, PSUFA, and the Postal Workers union as well as Oregon House District 27 Candidate Tammy Carpenter. Their presence sent a clear message: our members are not alone, and the broader labor movement is paying attention.
The inimitable Frank Goulard opened with a clear breakdown of the historical costing of past contracts and reopeners, making it clear that our proposals are reasonable, grounded in precedent, and well within the normal scope of bargaining. We are not asking for anything extreme. Frank also emphasized that this contract is about more than a cost of living adjustment (COLA) alone. Many of our proposals have negligible costs but would make a real difference in members’ working lives. Administration had no questions and offered no engagement.
We then asked administration to explain their bargaining framework, in which they have claimed that only COLA, insurance caps, and the Trupp study are mandatory subjects of bargaining, while labeling all other proposals as “permissive.” We pushed back hard. Many of the proposals they are refusing to engage on are clearly tied to wages and benefits, such as the proposal to move PT faculty pay from 75% to 80% in order to make it equitable with FT faculty instructional pay. Administration said they only want to bargain salary structure and insurance and are relying on “past practice.” When pressed, they could not explain that analysis. Instead, they admitted the larger issue is budget, not whether the proposals are permissive. When asked to explain past practice, their only response was that it was “the advice they were given.” They refused to meaningfully defend their position.
We then passed counterproposals on COLA and healthcare caps. We acknowledged that the HSA plan may help some employees, but made clear it does not work for many of our members. We are willing to keep the HSA option, but we are demanding that the college take real responsibility for rising health care costs. We also reiterated our demand that part-time faculty receive prorated insurance caps. This is a basic issue of fairness, and we made clear that Workday should be able to handle these calculations without difficulty.
After caucusing, we concluded there was nothing more we could accomplish that day since management, once again, did not come with any proposals. We reminded administration that our members are watching closely and that we expect them to come to mediation with counterproposals beyond just COLA and insurance caps. Mediation must bring movement, not more delay.
We ended the session early and immediately held a town hall to update members on the state of bargaining and discuss President Benning’s response to our open letter.
Here’s a great video of our colleagues discussing the claims in the response and how it is affecting them on the ground with students. Click the video below to play!
