The union that represents 23,000 professors, librarians and coaches at California State University voted Monday to strike on Nov. 17, canceling classes that day for tens of thousands of students at the system's East Bay and Dominguez Hills campuses.
"Our members are angry and are willing to take this kind of action to get the attention of the chancellor," California Faculty Association President Lillian Taiz said in a phone call with reporters.
The faculty union has been at odds with university management for years, and campus protests denouncing Chancellor Charles Reed are not uncommon. But this is the first time the union has ever approved a strike, Taiz said.
The parties are negotiating a new contract as well as "reopeners" from their prior contract.
Faculty are striking over an issue in the prior contract: the university's decision not to grant a so-called "equity raise" program that would increase the salary of faculty members who have been with the university for many years but make less than recently hired professors.
The increases would affect 40 percent of the faculty, the university says, and cost $20 million.
The union says that the raises are needed in the interest of fairness and that the money is a tiny portion of CSU's overall budget. The university says that it's already agreed to more than $59 million in raises for faculty during the two years of the contract that's been reopened and that state budget cuts in recent years make it imprudent to spend more.
"The $20 million CFA is … striking over would pay for 315 full-time temporary lecturer jobs, enrollment of 2,800 students or 3,150 course sections," a statement from the CSU Chancellor's Office says.
Faculty at all 23 CSU campuses will be holding informational pickets today and Wednesday in advance of the Nov. 17 strike.
© Copyright The Sacramento Bee. All rights reserved.
Call Laurel Rosenhall, Bee Capitol Bureau, (916) 321-1083. Follow her on Twitter @LaurelRosenhall.
• Read more articles by Laurel Rosenhall
What You Should Know About Comments on Sacbee.com
Sacbee.com is happy to provide a forum for reader interaction, discussion, feedback and reaction to our stories. However, we reserve the right to delete inappropriate comments or ban users who can't play nice. (See our full terms of service here.)
Here are some rules of the road:
• Keep your comments civil. Don't insult one another or the subjects of our articles. If you think a comment violates our guidelines click the "Report Abuse" link to notify the moderators. Responding to the comment will only encourage bad behavior.
• Don't use profanities, vulgarities or hate speech. This is a general interest news site. Sometimes, there are children present. Don't say anything in a way you wouldn't want your own child to hear.
• Do not attack other users; focus your comments on issues, not individuals.
• Stay on topic. Only post comments relevant to the article at hand.
• Do not copy and paste outside material into the comment box.
• Don't repeat the same comment over and over. We heard you the first time.
• Do not use the commenting system for advertising. That's spam and it isn't allowed.
• Don't use all capital letters. That's akin to yelling and not appreciated by the audience.
• Don't flag other users' comments just because you don't agree with their point of view. Please only flag comments that violate these guidelines.
You should also know that The Sacramento Bee does not screen comments before they are posted. You are more likely to see inappropriate comments before our staff does, so we ask that you click the "Report Abuse" link to submit those comments for moderator review. You also may notify us via email at feedback@sacbee.com. Note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us the profile name of the user who made the comment. Remember, comment moderation is subjective. You may find some material objectionable that we won't and vice versa.
If you submit a comment, the user name of your account will appear along with it. Users cannot remove their own comments once they have submitted them.
About Comments
Reader comments on Sacbee.com are the opinions of the writer, not The Sacramento Bee. If you see an objectionable comment, click the "Report Abuse" link below it. We will delete comments containing inappropriate links, obscenities, hate speech, and personal attacks. Flagrant or repeat violators will be banned. See more about comments here.