This below is from their NEIU UPI Chapter website, 11/19/04 . Check it for more details ongoing www.upi4100.org/neiu. I am sure they would welcome encouragement on the picket lines on Foster Avenue. They are picketing M-R 6:30 AM - 8:30 PM, F 6:30 AM-6:00 PM, Sat. 7:00 AM-1:30 PM. Contrary to some media reports, this strike DOES include the UNIT B contingent faculty, our colleagues, many of whom teach at other schools as well.
Faculty and staff at Northeastern Illinois University began walking the picket lines at 6:30 a.m. Friday, Nov. 19. After 16 hours of bargaining Thursday, the administration increased its proposal by only 0.13 percent. "We don't believe they are making a truly genuine effort to settle this," said Ed Hunt, president of the Northeastern chapter of University Professionals of Illinois.
The average salaries of faculty and staff at Northeastern are the lowest among state universities. The university's proposal equals a 2 percent increase for most of the UPI membership. Union leaders believe the university can afford the proposal they are asking for. "They typically budget millions of dollars more than they spend, and those dollars focus more on administrative costs than instruction," Hunt said.
Friday's picket lines are scheduled from 6:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturday's picket lines are scheduled from 7 a.m. to 1:30 p.m.
E-mail from Joe Berry to COCAL list, November 19, 2004
Dear Brothers and Sisters:
You've probably heard by now that our 400+-member UPI 4100 Chapter at Northeastern Illinois University went out on strike last Friday morning. I have attached a summary of our issues, and a recent piece from the Sun-Times.
We are up against an Administration that has made it clear in the last two weeks that it is not only unwilling to bargain seriously while, but is seeking to bust this activist union. This should be a matter of concern for anyone who wants Illinois to continue being able to offer an affordable, quality public education to our children.
We are therefore asking that our Brothers and Sisters in the labor movement and in labor-supportive community organizations JOIN US ON THE PICKET LINE this week.
We are asking that you come out Monday, Tuesday and/or Wednesday for whatever time you can commit. We have 400+ committed members, but we also have to cover four entrances each day. Your support will send a message to the Administration that this contract is a matter of concern to EVERYONE in the Chicago area.
Please let me know if you will be able to send a "formal delegation"-wear your shirts and bring banners and signs to identify your organization! We will welcome support any time any of you can give us.
Where are we: Foster Avenue at Central Park (accessible from the Kennedy Foster Ave. exit) or Bryn Mawr between Central Park and St. Louis
When: Monday November 22-Wednesday November 24
6:30 a.m.-8:30 p.m.
Who to contact: Jamie Daniel, UPI Local 4100 Director of Organizing and Development
Ph. 312-909-1121
WEAR YOUR ORGANIZATION SHIRTS AND BRING YOUR BANNERS AND SIGNS IF YOU CAN SEE YOU ON THE PICKET LINE!
Resources:
We arrived by 9:30 AM and waited a half hour while the mediators talked in another room with the admin team. Jon left a note on their door that we were waiting for them and they finally came in. They had Gary Hamburg's letter with them and told us they were very concerned because we were going to lose our health and dental benefits on Wednesday. They went on for a few minutes while we sat flabbergasted. They were practically reading the letter to us and telling us we needed to do something right away to avoid losing our benefits. This was very peculiar behavior for a couple of federal mediators.
We told them that COBRA would kick in and they said they didn't think it applied to us. More flabbergastion on our part. We told them that if the admin would spend some time and energy on negotiating a settlement instead of worrying about our loss of benefits, the question of benefits would be moot.
We presented them with a new proposal that offered to set aside any consideration of compensation in an effort to compromise (we used the word several times) and move the process of negotiation forward. We offered to bargain on the workload articles that we had discussed last week. The mediators took our offer and left.
We had the IFT call CMS about the status of the notification of a strike by the university. NEIU has to tell CMS that we are on strike before any of the processes that we have been talking about happen. CMS was not even aware that there has been a strike at NEIU since Nov.19. In other words, the earliest we would be notified by CMS about COBRA would be about three weeks from now and then we would have 60 days to accept COBRA and another 45 to pay for it. This puts it well toward spring.
The mediators returned and said there was no response to our proposal but the admin had made a change of 3 cues in the summer work load article in their package. The offer from them was again to take or leave their package. This was the same package we rejected last week and the same salary offer the membership got the letter about months ago. We said no and asked to bargain about our proposal. There was no interest in doing that so we asked when we could meet again.
The date that was available for the mediators and the admin team was next Wednesday. It took 45 minutes to arrive at that because they had a lot of other things to do that had to be moved around.
The president's office released a statement that the president was appalled that the union had left the bargaining table. For it to be a bargaining table, some bargaining would have to be occurring. It is not bargaining when one side repeats a demand to accept its offer or nothing. With the scare tactics of Hamburg's phony letter about health care, the deportation fiasco, the phone calls to students threatening them unless they return to class, the threats to Instructors to force them back to work, this seems to be turning into a mad effort to break the union at any cost rather than an effort to achieve a settlement. The damage to the university mounts daily and next week, time to complete the semester in December runs out.
The Union responded to the President's first memo by offering to negotiate any time, any place, 24/7. This did not always happen but we did make progress while the administration was willing to negotiate. Now it explicitly refuses to negotiate and simply demands capitulation. We challenge the administration again, if it actually wants to negotiate a settlement and reach an agreement through good faith bargaining, to return to the table, with or without mediators.
We certainly do not choose to be out in the cold, the rain, the snow, the dark for no good reason. We are out to demand that we receive a fair contract with decent pay and a good working environment. We will not stay out on the sidewalk one second longer than we need to. We won't leave one second sooner than we have to.
Well, it's clear that I am an optimist. I had really thought that by this time, the strike would be over and I could step back into my university, my classrooms and my career. I was really wrong. Below is an update of our last negotiation effort. Some of you had asked how you could help show your support . if you are still of that mind, please come and join us on the picket line. We're there every day between 6:30 am and 8 pm. If you can't do that and still want to show support, send emails, letters, or make phone calls to the university president Salme Steinberg, to the members of the NEIU Board of Trustees, to your state reps, to the governor, to the press....
I look forward to seeing you again back in the classroom as soon as possible. Keep warm. Keep studying:)
Shahrzad Mahootian
Striking Professor (ambiguity is wonderful, isn't it?!)
Report on Settlement from NEIU Independent (student newspaper)
by Andrew Valkanas
Staff Writer/Fact Checker
After 17 days on the picket lines, UPI Local 4100 chapter president Ed Hunt, university president Salme Steinberg, and state senators Ira Silverstein (D-8th) and Rev. James Meeks (D-15th) announced a tentative agreement in a press conference late Tuesday. "After ratification by the union tomorrow, school will open here at Northeastern," said Senator Rev. Meeks.
Though precise details of the "tremendously complex contract," according to Ed Hunt, are not available due to the local's pending ratification vote, Hunt was optimistic. "At times I'd wondered if I had died and gone to hell or just purgatory," said Hunt. "It's nice to be out of the rain."
Hunt provided some of the high points of the new agreement: "[There's] a rewritten grievance procedure, which both sides initially said needed to be done; some of the issues in workload were resolved very positively; and of course, in any kind of contract negotiation, salary is a big issue and was a big issue during these negotiations and I think both sides, especially today, cooperated and brainstormed and came up with some creative solutions. So I think both sides are happy with the salary solution."
"The union wanted to make sure that all the [professors] were taken care of," Meeks said.
"This agreement is evidence of the renewed willingness by so many constituencies to work together on the university's mission of learning and teaching," said Steinberg. "I believe that the university will once again return to a place where we provide students with the high quality education that they have come to know at this very wonderful university."
Rev. Meeks acknowledged the influence of students in helping speed the negotiations. "I was asked a week or two ago by several of the student groups to get involved in the negotiations here at Northeastern; I think they asked because I had been successful at [resolving the strike at] City Colleges [of Chicago] and I was hesitant for a while to get involved." The students weren't alone in asking for the Reverend's help; "The teachers' union called and also asked I get involved," said Rev. Meeks.
A major concern is the effect the nearly three-week strike will have on classes. As previously reported in the Independent, the university will be closed from Dec. 23rd to Jan. 2nd. Salme Steinberg, though, stated, "I believe all classes, including finals, will end by the close of business Dec 22, when the university closes for the holiday break."
"The important part, for those students who needed to finish this semester in 2004 is that will be accomplished in the time that remains," said Steinberg. The start of the spring 2005 semester will not be delayed either, assuming ratification of the contract. While ratification is still up to the members of Local 4100, Hunt said, "I'm pretty happy with the proposal, and I know the negotiating team is happy with it, and we will recommend to the membership to accept it."
"I think the contract is something this university can be very proud of, and I fully expect it to be a model for other universities, at least in Illinois, to emulate, because it is a blueprint for the future," said Hunt.
"Tonight is the first night of Hanukkah, a holiday of miracles, and we're celebrating a miracle tonight," said Sen. Silverstein, an alumnus of Northeastern. "Their main goal has been for the students of the university. I'm sure that with this agreement, this university will continue to grow." -I-
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Contributing to the settlement: The Chairman of the Northeastern Board of Directors is Daniel Goodwin, graduate of NEIU and Chairman of the Inland Real Estate Group in Oakbrook, IL.
As reported in the Chicago Tribune, Mr. Goodwin donated $400,000 to Northeastern to be used for teachers salaries. It was supposed to be an anonymous donation, but it got out.
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