Negotiations Report #12

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May 13, 2025

Some brief takeaways from our tenth negotiation session on May 9th:

  • Steve Lehigh, our union Treasurer, AFT representative to the District Committee of Budget and Finance, and Professor of Economics at CSM, made a compelling presentation regarding the District’s budget.  Steve’s presentation made it clear that our economic proposals (on compensation, benefits, load, etc.) are not only economically feasible, but wholly justified.

This Friday will be our last negotiation session until an end-of-semester break until June 12th.

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Current Bargaining Report

AFT Negotiation Team: Monica Malamud, Chet Lexvold, Jennifer Van Sijill, Gil Perez, Luis Zuñiga, Althea Kippes.  Also in attendance from AFT were Co-Presidents Rika Yonemura-Fabian and Tamara Perkins, and Observers Teeka James, Jessica Silver-Sharp, Steve Lehigh, Mine Kocak, Manny Delgado, and Lori Slicton.

From the District: Ellen Wu, Julie Johnson, Richard Storti, David Feune, Aaron McVean, Gerardo Ramirez.

Informal Complaints and Formal Misconduct Investigations (Article 23)

This was an article that the District sunshined (brought to negotiations), and after the District essentially accepted our previous counter except for some minor language edits, we informed the District we are ready to reach a tentative agreement (“TA”) on this article.

Compensation (Article 8)

First, we had our union Treasurer and Professor of Economics at College of San Mateo, Steve Lehigh, make a compelling presentation regarding the District’s budget.  You can view Steve’s slides here, and Steve’s verbal explanations really added context to drive home the fact that the District can not only afford to fund our economic proposals, but owes faculty members to make them whole from past, unjust compensation packages.  A few notes on the presentation:

  • Slide 2: the salary increase for faculty from Aug. 2020-Aug. 2024 was 16.40%, but inflation was 21.10%, meaning faculty suffered a net loss of 4.70% over that time period.
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  • Slide 4: the District’s savings from violating the 50% law over the past nine years is over $106 million.  The total of the next highest district out of compliance is less than $10 million.  In other words, our District is a massive outlier across the state in terms of how much less than 50% of its budget is committed to faculty.
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  • Furthermore, in slide 5, Steve showed that the portion of the District’s revenue committed to faculty has actually decreased over the past four years.
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  • Additionally, Steve verbally pointed out that the District has overfunded a pension fund while diverting revenue to capital projects even though the District has received hundreds of millions in bond funds for said capital projects.

Subsequently, our Chief Negotiator, Monica Malamud, presented our first counterproposal on Article 8, Compensation, which was effectively identical to our first proposal on this article.  We had a slight adjustment on 8.13 to propose paying FT counselors beyond the 175 days at the non-instructional lab rate, unit banking, or compensatory time.  On Multi-Modal and Multi-Level classes, we proposed increasing their load by 25% to accommodate courses not loaded at 1.0 FLC.  Finally, we explained there is no need for a study group in order to transition to load-based pay.

  • Previous study groups between the District and faculty have not been productive and have not reached actionable conclusions.
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  • We already surveyed our faculty across disciplines and made the appropriate proposal for Appendix F.
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  • The District’s objection that they need a study group to technically figure out how to implement load-based pay is not persuasive – that’s something for the District to figure out, and they can consult a large number of local districts that already pay by load.  There’s no need for the union or faculty to be involved in that process.

 

Safety Conditions of Employment (Article 16)

We presented our first proposal on this article, proposing an expansion of the District’s responsibility to provide safe conditions of employment not just at primary worksites, but anywhere faculty are performing their duties.  Other aspects of this proposal include:

  • Requiring emergency boxes on campuses, as some areas lack cellular service;
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  • Making it the District’s responsibility to eliminate, mitigate, and/or report on hazards, including workplace violence and climate-related hazards;
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  • Eliminating current 16.5, an “appeal process” which is unnecessary in light of our current grievance process;
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  • Inserting language referencing CA law that provides for employers seeking restraining orders on behalf of their employees;
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  • Regular safety trainings and trainings on mandated reporting requirements, including payment for PT faculty attending said trainings; and
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  • Making SMCCCD a Safe Workplace for Transgender Faculty, which would require the District, at the request of the faculty member, to work with the faculty member to make the workplace safe and respectful of their gender identity, particularly during their gender transition.

 

Summer Employment (Article 18)

The District presented their second counter on Article 18, which was identical to their first counter.  Their Co-Chief Negotiator, Ellen Wu, explained the District is fine clarifying which articles apply to summer employment, but is not interested in expanding which articles apply.

 

Professional Development “Leave” Program (Article 13)

The District presented their third counter, and we presented our third counter in the same session.

  • The District countered with status-quo 1% funding, which we countered again at 1.25%.
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  • The District accepted our “two consecutive semesters” language so a leave could encompass spring and fall semesters
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  • We agreed on language expanding who can participate in short-term project leaves.  Now, in addition to part-time faculty, tenured and third- and fourth-year tenure-track faculty, second-year tenure-track faculty will be eligible if they receive meets or exceeds in all categories of evaluations, and second-years can apply for said project leaves as soon as the Board of Trustees approves that they can advance to Contract II.

 

Part-Time Employment (Article 19)

The District agreed to provide one (1) update to the seniority lists prior to the end of the semester.

  • The District accepted our strikethrough of their proposal to remove part-timers from seniority lists for declining assignments two consecutive semesters.
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  • In the case of retirement, after we rejected their proposal to remove these faculty from seniority lists, the District proposed moving these folks to the bottom of seniority lists.
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  • The District re-proposed “sustained complaint” language as a reason to remove faculty from the seniority list.
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  • The District continues to reject our proposal that experience and qualifications “for a particular assignment” should be the language in 19.2.1, citing “management’s right to assignment.”
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  • On 19.2.4 – Load – the District again proposed status quo “same or similar” language.

 

Retirement (Article 10)

We again proposed increasing the reimbursement amount in 10.1.3 to $1,000 from $450.

 

Part-Time Healthcare MOU (Memorandum of Understanding)

The District did not present a counter on this topic.

 

Benefits (Article 9)

We did not present a counter on Benefits.

 

Dual Enrollment (New Article)

We did not present a counter on this article.

 

Hours of Employment (Article 7)

The District did not present a counter to our proposal on this article.

 

Workload (Article 6 and Appendix D)

The District did not present a counter to our proposal on this article.

 

Faculty Load Credit (FLC) Allocation (Appendix F )

The District did not present a counter to our proposal on this.

 

Leaves (Article 11)

The District did not present a counter to our proposal on this article.

 

Reasonable Accommodation (Article 25)

We’ve reached a tentative agreement on this article!

 

Grievance Procedure (Article 17)

We’ve reached a tentative agreement on this article!

In solidarity,

Chet Lexvold
Executive Director, AFT 1493
lexvold@aft1493.org