Lay offs at work! Grrrrr. And I'm worried BIGTIME abt my job or will I even have one.
Labor, district clash
Porterville: Local college could be affected by layoffs.
By Aaron Burgin
The Porterville Recorder
June 15
BAKERSFIELD — A labor dispute between the Kern Community College District and employees union representatives that has stewed since last year reached a fevered pitch this week.
The California School Employees Association filed a grievance and a lawsuit against the district, accusing it of violating fair labor practices when it sent layoff and reorganization notices to a dozen employees in May.
Union officials from across the Valley, clad in blue shirts and armed with picket signs, staged an informational protest outside of the district office in downtown Bakersfield noontime Thursday.
“This has gotten really ugly and has hurt a lot of people,” said Michael Lynn, a CSEA labor relations representative. The layoffs in question were part of a Board of Trustees-approved reorganization of several district departments, including the business services and corporate-and-community-services departments at all three KCCD campuses.
The reorganization would result in a dozen employees being laid off or getting steep pay cuts, including a Bakersfield College accounting supervisor who is also the union’s Bakersfield chapter president, Lynn said. CSEA representatives said they were done without prior negotiations with the union, which they said is a violation of the union-district collective bargaining agreement. The union filed the grievance with the Public Employees Relations Board last week, and also filed a civil lawsuit in Kern County Superior Court, claiming the district violated the shared governance code, which protects staff and faculty’s right to participate in district governance. Additionally, Lynn said, the CSEA contends that administrators have tried to undermine the union by sending an e-mail to all employees Wednesday night that blamed the union for the impasse. “This place is run like a [darn] plantation,” Lynn said. Other union members believe the district is targeting the union and is trying to weaken the union with the manner of handling the cuts. “If management is able to handle the layoffs like this in this department, it will be a domino effect, and when will it stop?” said Michelle Hart, Porterville College-CSEA chapter president. Officials from the district, which includes Porterville College, fired back that they did not violate any statutes, and did not have to negotiate the reorganization with union officials. Victor Collins, the KCCD vice chancellor of human resources, said the collective bargaining agreement has no statutes that mandate the administration to negotiate any of the cuts. The district, he said, can negotiate the “effect” of the reorganization, meaning negotiating new positions for the displaced workers. Lynn said it is CSEAs position that negotiation regarding these cuts should have been discussed with the union prior to reaching the board’s table. Anything less would be unlawful, Lynn said. Those negotiations, however, halted Wednesday after district officials declared an impasse after six hours of negotiations with CSEA officials. A state-appointed mediator will likely have to bring both parties back to the bargaining table, Collins said. “We believe that we have interpreted the agreement correctly, the union doesn’t,” said Collins, as protesters below shouted, “Shame on you.” “That is really the issue right now,” Collins said. Talks of the reorganizations began in May 2006, district officials said. On May 10, the board voted unanimously in favor of the reorganization, and the human resources department issued layoff notices to the employees affected. After determining how many employees would be affected by the reorganization, district and union officials met Wednesday to negotiate the terms of the layoffs. Collins said the district offered a “Y-rating” for the employees, meaning they would retain the current salary, but would not receive any raises until their current position’s salary range exceeded their pay. The deal, Lynn said, had a number of conditions — another alleged violation of fair labor practices — so the union rejected the offer. Collins immediately declared an impasse. Now, Collins said the district will request a mediator from the state Mediation and Conciliation Services to mediate negotiations between both groups. Employees and union officials said they just want the district to play fair — and legal. “I would like to believe that we are past those sort of tactics,” said Jennifer Marden, the BC chapter president affected by the reorganization. “But there are a lot of employees who feel like the district is targeting the CSEA, and we won’t stand for that.”
