July marks the beginning of CCSF’s Fiscal Year 2013-14. As such, it marks CCSF’s implementation of its latest assault on faculty pay. While the two 2012-13 cuts to the salary schedule —the negotiated 2.85% cut and the later cut of 4.4% annually that was effectively doubled to 9% because it was imposed in January this year—sunset, as of July the District’s ongoing, permanent cut of 5% on all faculty goes into effect.
Despite continued time at the bargaining table, a host of savings at the College including record savings from retirements, and a state budget that, along with Prop A funding, clearly returns District funding to pre-recession levels, CCSF administration and the Board have shown no willingness to return faculty to pre-recession levels. Faculty pay on July 31 paychecks will thus be 5% less than the negotiated 2007-08 pay scales on which all faculty pay is based.
AFT 2121 last week filed a new grievance over District negotiators’ refusal and failure to bargain over new revenues for 2013-14 in accordance with the contract. An earlier grievance is still in process, headed toward arbitration, which is scheduled to begin in October.
Last Thursday, CCSF’s Board of Trustees reiterated its commitment to permanently downgrading faculty salaries when it adopted its updated tentative budget.
The District’s tentative budget
- cuts faculty (and administrative) salaries by 5% even though revenues are now back to pre-recession levels;
- sets aside $2 million to restore classified positions and other “priorities” with no mention of faculty needs;
- overreaches by putting $6.3 million into reserves.
AFT 2121’s proposed alternative budget sought to
- return faculty salaries to 2007-08* levels (no 5% cut);
- put $3.2 million into the Board Desingated Reserve, thus bringing the Fund Balance to above the 5% level recommended by the State Chancellor’s Office, i.e. to 6%. Eliminate the $850K Special Designated Reserve, striking a better balance between building up fiscal reserves and the needs of employees and educational programs;
- raise pay for CCSF’s student workers to meet San Francisco’s minimum wage;
- identify millions more in unallocated funds for other CCSF needs and priorities, including those of classified staff and program review priorities.
*The negotiated 2007-08 Salary Schedule (see CBA, Exhibit B) represents the last time faculty received a raise at CCSF. Wage concessions and the unilateral wage cuts by the District reduced full-time and part-time faculty salaries in recent years.
A number of trustees expressed concerns about the direction the budget represented for the College. Trustee Grier noted that the budget under consideration “still harms our employees and students” and said the Board needs “to be sure to spend the money of what the voters voted for… We need to do what’s right.” She opened up the question of the College’s priorities as represented in the budget and raised questions about the amount of money being put into savings in 2013-14.
Echoing concerns about spending priorities and the needs of workers, Trustee Mandelman directed the District’s financial officers to “find more money in our budget to address those two priorities: staffing the college adequately, and increasing salaries of people who have given back more than I think they should have had to.”
Trustee Jackson followed up: “When we have so many needs for our students and our campus community, and for the community overall, how much is enough for right now? What’s that balance between having a good reserve, but also adequately making sure we have a healthy College as well?”
Newly seated Student Trustee Shanell Williams presented a host of hard questions and concerns, including the impact of salary cuts, questions about money spent on consulting and legal fees, and the need for CCSF to join San Francisco in paying minimum wage to student workers, currently paid $9/hr while the City’s minimum wage is $10.55/hr. The Board now plans to revist this issue at its next meeting.
Student Trustee Williams asked the simple question: “How do we expect to retain faculty with the permanent 5% reduction?” She was the lone vote against the tentative budget, but as the student trustee’s vore is advisory, the tentative budget was adopted unanimously by those with official votes.
A final buget must be in place in September. Look for more from AFT 2121 on the budget and financial picture, the sad lack of progress in negotiations, and CCSF’s accreditation process as well as the ACCJC in the upcoming weeks.
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