Negotiations may be at an end

 

Faculty, board ratify and sign full-time contract

 

MHCC full-time faculty members are now working under a new labor contract that will run through September 2017.

The contract was ratified by unanimous vote by the MHCC District board and signed into effect on Monday.

Full-Time Faculty Association members voted to ratify the contract by a “comfortable” majority during a voting period that ended Feb. 12, according to Sara Williams, association president.

“It’s final. No backing up,” Williams said with a laugh. She said she feels peaceful knowing the contract is settled.

Williams said she believes faculty members are “very pleased with the language improvements that we were able to accomplish.

“I think the financial package is a compromise that is acceptable in the light of (MHCC) needing to pass a bond (measure)… working together is a critical piece of that,” she said.

Williams wants the broader community to know the pay package in the new contract “really was a compromise and that the association is willing to accept that because it’s the right thing to do for the college,” she said. “I think it’s important that people know that.”

The deal closes lengthy, often-stalled negotiations that began with preliminary talks in autumn 2012. MHCC President Debbie Derr, who arrived in July, sat at the table during latter stages of the negotiations. Ultimately, a mediator was brought in to broker a settlement.

Maggie Huffman, MHCC director of communications, said, “Unfortunately, the process took many months. It is important to note that bargaining was collaborative and collegial, which is the evidence of successful bargaining.”

Williams’ tenure as faculty leader comes to an end after the winter term. Her successor has already been elected by union members (results were not disclosed by The Advocate’s press deadline).

“I love the job and I would certainly be interested in doing it again someday,” Williams said. But her three-year stint “is a year longer than I think is healthy,” she said. “I think it’s really critical for the health of an organization to not have too much stability.”

She said she’ll turn her attention to a ballot measure Oregon Education Association hopes to place before Oregon voters in the fall to increase state revenue.

“We cannot continue to make due with less money and to attempt to balance the budget on the backs of (employee) contracts and student tuition,” she said. “There has to be a public investment in education.”

 

Classified employees voting on agreement 

 

Mt. Hood’s classified employees are now voting on a labor contract agreement tentatively reached by union and MHCC negotiators on Feb. 4.

Voting began Wednesday and will continue through noon Monday. If the employees vote to ratify the contract, the MHCC District board would vote on the proposed contract in March.

The employees association held a general meeting for its members Wednesday morning. Cathy Nichols, classified association president, said she has received mostly positive feedback.

“I believe for this three-year period (through September 2017), this is a good contract,” Nichols said. “The language that’s in this contract, I believe, sets us up for better negotiations in the future.”

Substantial changes to current rules governing classified workers would include “tight language” in department outsourcing, a notification policy for layoffs, a cost of living adjustment and updated salary “step” system (both retroactive to last July 1), Nichols said.

The “step” system is salary grid for employees that schedules regular pay rate increases to reward longevity. In all, there are 11 steps.

About half of classified employees at Mt. Hood have reached that final step and are considered “maxed out,” said Nichols.

“We had language in there… under the automatic steps that got put in the last negotiations, that said no steps (would be implemented) until the contract was negotiated,” she said. This froze classified employees in place, while Mt. Hood’s full-time faculty members did not face such restrictions. She called the discrepancy “a real slap in the face to some of the members.”

Another “win” for the classified association is that in the event of a planned employee layoff, the college would have to notify the union 20 days before notifying the affected worker. That lag would give the association time to examine alternatives and potentially save the worker’s position, Nichols said. In the previous contract, no advance notice was required.

Nichols said her bargaining team “fought hard” for what it sought in a contract.  Meantime, classified workers could be seen on campus wearing T-shirts, posting supportive signs on desks, even chanting in the campus courtyard. “We asked members to step up outside of their comfort zones, and for me, it was great to see that,” she said of the show of solidarity.

Nichols’ bargaining team labored for many long evenings and traded emails on weekends to discuss contract details, since classified workers may not set meetings for negotiations during normal work hours.

She found that it was disheartening and “felt different” that Mt. Hood President Debbie Derr was present at the table for one contract process (full-time faculty) but not for classified employee talks, she said.

Derr did not sit in on negotiations for the classified contract, but kept contact by telephone. That included one late-night call that woke her, Derr said.

In the end, Nichols praised what she called a devoted union effort.

“It’s a huge time commitment. I couldn’t ask for a better team,” she said of the process that extended for more than a year. While the bargainers didn’t get everything in the “candy store” that employees might have wanted, she views the result as a success.

Now, it’s time to “sit back and let members choose what they want,” she said.