AAUP bargaining hits standstill

The university and the Portland State chapter of the American Association of University Professors returned to the bargaining table on Nov. 16, but little progress was made during the session, which means the union and university will enter mediation on Dec. 14.

The faculty contract, which expired on June 31, has been extended twice, with the current deadline at Nov. 30. The PSU-AAUP union represents approximately 1,200 full-time faculty members.

“There is no movement on either side—it feels stuck,” said Megan McLaughlin, international student advisor and a PSU-AAUP member, describing her impression of the meeting.

The union continues to push for equity raises, citing furloughs, pay freezes and no cost-of-living increases over the last several biennia as reasons for pay increases now. PSU-AAUP is also pushing back against the state-mandated 5 percent contribution to employee health care premiums.

Mary King, economics professor and chief negotiator for PSU-AAUP, said, “We have to come close to our comparators and we have to at least mitigate the harshest of the costs of the health insurance plan for people who are least able to assume those costs.”

On Oct. 28, the university offered a 4.1 percent increase to faculty salaries for each year of the biennium, with half of the increase delivered via a five-tier merit package; the union rejected this proposal. According to King, the proposed merit package would exclude 30 percent of the faculty, and only 10 percent of the “most meritorious” members would be kept up with inflation.

On Nov. 16, the university returned to the table with another option: The union could accept the previous package, or it could take a 3 percent increase with no merit package each year of the biennium.

The administration expressed a willingness to hear counter proposals from the union. However, the union walked out of the negotiations because they believed the second option, which offered less money than previous proposals, was a punitive measure in response to the union’s rejection of the merit package.

“I think these are hostile actions,” King said.

Merit structures used in the past have raised many concerns among faculty. However, according to Bob Liebman, sociology professor and a member of the PSU-AAUP bargaining team, the union “does support a merit structure where faculty compete against a standard, not against each other—a merit structure with a clear and transparent target and with peer evaluation for salaried increases tied to merit.”

According to Ron Narode, associate professor of education and a member of the PSU-AAUP bargaining team, the administration’s offer fails to bring the faculty closer to comparators and “doesn’t address equity.”

Narode cites sporadic cost of living increases over the last 20 years, which have failed to keep faculty salaries in line with the market. According to OUS Factbooks for 2009 and 2010, PSU’s average faculty salaries rank 10th out of 10 universities of similar size and demographics.

The university will not comment on the on-going negotiations; however, Scott Gallagher, director of communications, said that “the administration remains confident that an agreeable settlement will be reached.”

When asked if she was satisfied with her union’s priorities, McLaughlin said, “After five-and-a-half years, I am still at the bottom of the pay-scale with two master’s degrees and 13 years of experience—they might not be asking for enough.”