General Membership Minutes
NOTE: The General Assembly meets once each semester.
UNAPPROVED minutes of the AFT2121 General Membership Meeting of 10/20/09
ATTENDANCE: Delegates: Charles Belbin, Merle Burnick, Kate Connell, Marc Kitchel, Jacob Picheny, Bob Price, Carmen R. Roman-Murray, Shirley Sung. Executive Board Members: Ron Bixler, Rosemary Brinson, Allan Fisher, Stephen Goldston, Gus Goldstein, Chris Hanzo (Executive Director), Jim McKinney, Alisa Messer, Pablo Rodriguez, Kovak Williamson. Members: Anthony Costa, Diane Fredericks, Anita Martinez, Diana Verdugo, Lisa Wagner
CALL TO ORDER: The meeting was called to order at 3:05 p.m. at Mission Campus, Room 123.
MINUTES: The minutes of 3/24/09 were approved with minor revisions.
PRESIDENT'S REPORT: Gus Goldstein reported that she represented AFT2121 at a meeting in LA between the Community College Council (CFT group) and the Community College Association (CTA group) for a preliminary discussion on conjoining the two organizations. The next meeting is early next year.
TREASURER'S REPORT: Kovak Williamson noted that the Local's budget process includes a budget committee currently composed of the Treasurer, Executive Director, and Budget Analyst. An outside auditor works during the summer to complete the budget by September. In the meantime, the budget committee has been tracking our revenues and expenditures, and we may have a 4-5% reduction of revenues due to workload reductions, layoffs, and frozen salary steps. We must discuss whether we can hold the line or need to make cuts. However, no increase in dues is necessary at this time. The completed budget will be posted on aft2121.com.
REP REPORTS: Carmen Roman-Murray represented part-timers at the CCC/CCA unification meeting in LA. Though arguments can be made for unification, AFT2121 has made a lot of progress as an independent local. Carmen noted that although part-timers attended the LA meeting, they were underrepresented. Bob Price reported that since CCSF is a separate entity not subject to local minimum wage laws, student workers are paid below minimum. He suggested that we take a position to bring the rate up to minimum wage. Consensus existed for working with the Associated Students, which has brought this issue to the District in the past.
POLITICAL ACTION REPORT: Pablo Rodriguez praised us for getting ourselves heard at a recent rally at City Hall. He noted that Gus's speech at the rally was outstanding and particularly effective. Mayor Newsom's political director attended and expressed support of our efforts. Every Friday the Defend Our Education Coalition meets on Ocean Campus. CSU, UC, and K-12 have joined us. Contact AFT2121 to take part in fighting budget cuts. A rally will take place at UC Berkeley on Oct. 24 to oppose the cuts in education. Allan Fisher announced that a group will leave from 22nd and Bartlett to join the demonstration. We discussed activities for Community College Week, Nov. 2-6. AB645 is an oil tax that would go to education, but CSU, which wrote the bill, would receive 60% of the revenue, while community colleges would only get 10%. The bill is difficult to support, but CSU claims it will be revised. Gus reported that a statewide march 44-day march from community college to community college is being organized by CFT members.
BOARD OF TRUSTEES MEETING DEMONSTRATION: We discussed plans for an Oct. 22 demonstration at the Board of Trustees’ meeting opposing layoffs. We need more activism by the Trustees to prevent further layoffs and cutbacks. CFT Treasurer Dennis Smith is scheduled to speak, as are faculty and students. We must not only regain a full schedule of classes but also add classes to accommodate increasing enrollment. We will also show our opposition to layoffs of classified staff, who have lost 30 jobs.
CUTBACKS: Although the District determines staffing, ameliorating the impact of the budget cuts is negotiable. The 6.5% reduction in class hours has been made up by laying off retirees and cutting full-time overload. However, some departments did not make layoffs and 35 retirees are still working. Merle Burnick pointed out that part-timers have had their hours reduced and have carried the heaviest burden during this crisis. One suggestion is to reduce the full-time noncredit workload to 20 hours (no salary reduction). Part-timers whose hours have been reduced should be given priority in sub assignments. Discontinuing Friday classes was also suggested. We need to hear more suggestions from our members, and Reps should discuss the possibilities with members. We need a parcel tax. An existing property already helps K-12 salaries. We are limited as to what kinds of taxes we can control, but a parcel tax is a possibility.
CALENDAR 2010/11: We discussed aligning our spring break with K-12's. Our calendar for this year is before Easter, but in the future K-12 will schedule the break to fall at the same time each year, at the end of March, regardless of when Easter falls. Because Cesar Chavez Day would fall during the break, an additional day would be added to Spring Break. It was also suggested that we move the Cesar Chavez holiday to the end of semester. After Spring Break would be too late to withdraw from classes under current rules, so the District would have to be more lenient.
Motion: We should continue to align our spring break with SFUSD’s calendar. Seconded and passed.
NEGOTIATIONS: We will have many new full-time jobs next fall. To expedite tenure review, we are considering less stringent early tenure requirements and fewer people on tenure review committees. Our goal is more full-time positions, but in the current crisis part-time hours might be cut to accommodate full-time schedules. Ed reiterated the current hierarchy for layoffs. First to lose hours are retired CCSF faculty returning to work part time, then full-timers' overload assignments, and finally the smallest group, new part-timers no with rehire rights. Future cuts could cause layoffs to work up into the ranks of part-timers with rehire rights, in reverse order of seniority. Some feel we should work toward a system that accounts for those working outside of CCSF because the limitations on CCSF faculty are unfair in comparison. For example, under current practice, an instructor teaching full time in the K-12 system would not lose part-time hours (effectively overload for them) whereas a full-timer at CCSF would lose overload hours. Furthermore, retired CCSF faculty have lost hours, but retirees from other educational institutions have not been affected. We may be able to find out who is retired from other institutions through the lack of STRS deductions. However, they may still be subject to Social Security deductions. Because Social Security deductions are an option for regular part-timers, the fact that someone is paying a Social Security deduction rather than an STRS deduction would not reveal if that person is a retiree. Several voiced the fear that trying to determine which part-timers are active full-timers elsewhere or have retired from jobs at other educational institutions would lead to a witch-hunt mentality. Carmen pointed out we should use our resources to protect part-timers who have no other income as our goal is to protect them. Anita Martinez, paraphrasing Rodger Scott, said that we should make every attempt to protect the most vulnerable. Diana Verdugo stated that it's admirable that the Local is working toward an equitable system, even though dissension will exist. Alisa Messer and others agreed, but expressed concern as to how much privacy we should sacrifice in determining who should lose hours. Another suggestion was for full-timers to volunteer for reduced workloads and sabbaticals. Bob Price emphasized that we should do everything we can to avoid part-timers losing hours but not lose sight of the fact that we must fight back against the budget cuts. Reps should take the question of how to deal with the cuts to their precincts.
OLD BUSINESS: Gus called for volunteers and distributed flyers for the CCSF garage sale.
NEW BUSINESS: Allan reviewed a resolution he wrote to take to the CFT convention calling for a withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan. He noted that we spend $5 billion a month on Afghanistan. Steve Goldston reminded us that we are in the eighth year of the war. AFT2121 has long been on record as against the Iraq war.
Motion: We should support Allan Fisher’s resolution as amended against the war in Afghanistan and in favor of the withdrawal of troops. Seconded and passed.
Respectfully submitted,
Steve Goldston, Secretary