Editor,
Following the March 22 election to establish a union for education support staff, a number of rumors and concerns have spread around campus.
People are understandably anxious and excited. The new union will bring changes for those involved, and it is a movement toward positive change that most UNM employees want.
Unfortunately, some employees have been misinformed concerning pay raises for 2001-2002. No decisions have been made whatsoever by the University or the union.
Here are the facts:
1. The state Legislature's allocation, as approved by the Board of Regents, provides enough money to give all staff a 6.5 percent wage increase. Will the administration decide to award the entire amount? In the past, it has chosen not to. Perhaps this year the presence of another union at UNM will result in the full award.
2. The education support unit will decide what pay structure and pay increases will be negotiated for the next fiscal year prior to going into the negotiations. Whether any bonus - so-called "merit pay" - will be part of the contract depends on what the staff wants. We are surveying staff members on this point.
3. If negotiations for the contract extend past June 30, retroactive pay will be negotiable. Annual pay increase guidelines for those not yet in UNM collective bargaining units can be found in the Department of Human Resources budget. You may review them at www.unm.edu/~comp/pages/sswinstrl.html.
Whatever the University decides to allocate for 2001-2002, it will not address entrenched salary inequities.
Some questions to be considered include: Where are you in the "quartile systems" and should you be there? Does your salary reflect your market value?
But a contract is more than just about salaries. Employee protection and improvement clauses, including grievances (and your rights to be protected), workplace safety and the value of experience and education in determining job qualifications will be considered.
The bottom line is that we finally have the right to work together on this and other issues through the collective bargaining process. As with administrators' employment contracts, contracts negotiated with staff are binding and not subject to differing or capricious interpretations.
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Underlying that, of course, is the staff itself. We are not standing alone. We have the example and support of other educational employees in New Mexico and around the country. Just as we function as a team in our workplaces, our union team works for all of us. The more staff members participate in their union, the stronger the UNM education support staff will be.
The University and the Human Resource Department, through employee relations manager Patrick Vigil, have committed themselves to moving to the negotiating table. In a meeting with United Staff UNM representatives, Vigil said the University is "extremely interested and committed to negotiating a contract as quickly as possible."
Vigil also stated what we have said above, that all issues of salaries and benefits are subject to negotiation and no decisions have been made.
Harry Norton
Admissions officer
United Staff UNM member
