Dear Colleagues,
The UFF and Board of Trustees (BOT) teams met on Wednesday, July 14, to discuss salaries and other outstanding articles.
We saw a tremendous turnout—45 faculty. This perhaps flummoxed the BOT team, which sought to cancel the meeting. The ostensible reason was the UFF’s announcement that we planned to record the public meeting. We don’t understand the BOT’s reluctance to comply with Sunshine Laws—an excuse to cancel in the face of irritated faculty? An attack of shyness?—but the meeting continued nonetheless after two lengthy interruptions for BOT caucuses and after we offered to suspend our recording plan.
The UFF presented a counterproposal on Article 23 (Salaries) with somewhat lower across-the-board Increases (from 5% in our last offer to 4.5%, which is the latest inflation figure) and Merit Increases (from 2.5% to 2.25%). We also proposed a Memorandum of Agreement to allow Promotion and Sustained Performance Increases to be implemented even if negotiations about other categories are on-going.
The teams then discussed the BOT’s counter-proposal on Article 19 (Conflict of Interest and Outside Activity). We continue to work together to hammer out a definition of “outside activity” but still don’t see eye-to-eye on consensual sexual relationships with students.
The meeting ended on a positive note when the teams agreed to sign a Memorandum of Understanding to implement the Tuition Scholarship for Spouses and Dependents with a 25% increase in funding.
Although next week’s bargaining session had been planned for some time, the BOT team cancelled it. Could it have something to do with the faculty turnout this time around?
We will meet on Wednesday, July 28, from 2:00-4:00, and will send a link. We encourage you to show up! The ball is the BOT court to propose a salary counter-offer, so you should find it interesting!
Regular updates can be found at our webpage: https://uff-fsu.org/
The key to a strong collective bargaining agreement is a strong membership base, so if you are not a member, please join! There has never been a more important time for us to stand together. https://uff-fsu.org/wp/join/
All best,
Irene Padavic and Scott Hannahs
Co-Chief Negotiators, UFF-FSU