The Park Blocks will be empty. The library, cafeteria and halls will be silent. Lights will go down and so will the thermostat. Except for the sound of an accountant working hard to get holiday paychecks out, Oregon’s largest university will be like a ghost town.
This is Portland State in a budget deficit. No faculty, students or even administrative staff—folks who stay behind to work when classes are out—will be on campus from Dec. 19–28. When fall term 2009 is over, the university will close its doors as a cost-cutting measure.
For the faculty and staff at Portland State, the early vacation means no work and reduced pay.
As part of a bargaining agreement between Portland State and several employee unions—Service Employees International Union, American Association of University Professors and American Federation of Teachers—everyone must take mandatory, unpaid leave days during the month of December.
In a memo sent to all classified and unclassified staff, Portland State showed how it has created a system to determine the number of unpaid leave days staff are required to take according their salary ranking. The minimum number of leave days is three and four for unclassified and classified staff, respectively.
Unpaid leave days are a fair and satisfactory way of cutting salary, according to Cathy LaTourette, associate vice president of Human Resources.
“We’re not just going to reduce staff salary and make them work the same hours in order to save money,” LaTourette said. “In exchange for that, we’re also going to give them some days off.”
In April of this year, LaTourette, along with several higher-up administrators including President Wim Wiewel, took a voluntary salary reduction of 4.6 percent. LaTourette said the fiscal initiative was to give the unions more time to negotiate.
“Since then, all of the unions have negotiated and come up with their program,” LaTourette said.
For both cost-cutting and efficiency reasons, LaTourette said the university wants everyone to take their leave days during the holiday season and shut down Portland State during that period.
“We figured out that’s when there are the least number of people, and we have reduced work,” LaTourette said.
The first five leave days will be used Dec. 19–29, according to LaTourette. For those who have more than five days, they must take the rest of their days next year.
LaTourette said unpaid leave days most likely wouldn’t affect academic professionals who are on a salary basis and have the flexibility of working from home.
“Most of them don’t come [after finals] anyway. It’s dead here in terms of faculty,” LaTourette said.
In the contract for classified employees, there is also one paid leave day, called Special Day, to be taken only during the holiday.
LaTourette said for classified employees with only four leave days, they are to use their Special Day to cover the fifth closure day.
According to a memo from Lindsay Desrochers, vice president of Finance and Administration, unclassified staff should expect to see a reduced paycheck on Nov. 30 and classified staff in October.
To help alleviate the impact, salary reduction for classified employees will be divided over the year instead of in one month, said LaTourette.
“In the negotiation for classified employees, they said that it’s going be difficult for some people if they have their salary reduced in one month,” LaTourette said.
Instead, salary will be reduced by equal amounts every month from October to June, according to LaTourette. She also said part-time classified employees would get to keep their health benefits even if they go below the minimum number of work hours in order to qualify for health insurance in December.