Letter to All Faculty

Bad Budget/Tough Decisions

By David Yancey, FA AFT 6157, President

Colleagues and Friends,

I have been reading, as most of you have, the many emails expressing heart felt concern and upset over the pending layoffs of some of our fellow employees in this district. I also was in attendance at the Board of Trustees meeting Tuesday evening. As expected the meeting was dominated by the issue of the job reductions and layoffs. There were many speakers and emotions were running very high.

The terrible budgetary situation we are now facing in this district is very serious and its impact seems more significant because of the layoffs of our classified brothers and sisters. However, most of you may not know that there are adjunct faculty layoffs in this district every semester. Ironically, these instructors who dedicate themselves to our school and our students are let go without a single email in protest. Why? These layoffs are “silent” because most of them are not well known, and so most of the district’s permanent employees go on with their daily functions and duties without much reaction.

We Oppose All Layoffs:

The FA opposes all layoffs and will continue to do so because that is one of the main functions of a union. We also fight every day for other important issues for our membership such as bridge plans, better pay and improved working conditions. Although we deal with immediate issues daily our efforts, by necessity, must and do have a much longer view of things than any immediate crisis.

In that context let me address the emails calling for faculty “pay cuts.” This is an action the union has not and will not support and the reasons are multiple. Most people think, when they volunteer to take a pay cut, that those reductions during hard times will automatically be given back when financial times improve. This is not true! Reductions in pay are rarely regained. It is important to understand that “pay cuts” become a structural deficit in your pay for the rest of your career. A 5% or 10% cut, as some have suggested, remains a permanent part of the salary all the way through to retirement and beyond and even including the calculations used to determine your retirement income.

Pay Cuts are Not the Answer

Also, many faculty, are opposed to taking a pay cut, even though they don’t want to see others laid off, and are not likely to speak up in this difficult time and so the union must. Many of our full time faculty don’t have the convenience or the luxury of giving up parts of their salary as some have had job losses within their families that put added burden on them and others have small children, elderly parents or are close to retirement.

The fact is that there was no pay increase for anyone last year, and none is coming for this year and probably none for next year. In fact we don’t know how long this financial drought will last.

But for those who can and those who wish to donate to a contingency fund some amount in a one time donation, a continuing fixed amount or by assigning a 5% or 10% reduction of their salary, I would encourage you to do so. This fund could be monitored by the District foundation and those funds used to save jobs designated for elimination. I suppose the easiest way to maintain this fund would be through some sort of payroll deduction each person could set up through payroll to maintain a working amount of money. I would be respectful of the CSEA union and allow them to be the leading force for this option since most of the layoffs are within their unit.

I would be happy to donate to the fund myself.

David Yancey