Unions ask trustees to fund pacts

by Sarah R. Buchholz and Daniel J. Fitzgibbons, Chronicle staff

hree representatives of unions from across the University system spoke at the Aug. 7 meeting of the Board of Trustees, asking University officials to fund negotiated three-year contracts extending through fiscal 2004. In the wake of Acting Gov. Jane Swift's veto of state funds for the negotiated pay increases, union leaders appealed to the trustees to fund the pay raises included in the contracts.

     "We approved it; you approved it," said Dan Georgianna, president of the Massachusetts Federation of Teachers at the Dartmouth campus, of the negotiated contract. "We think that you should fund the contract. You should keep your word."
Georgianna cited student fee increases, capital expenditure funds, net savings from early retirements and monies in use to implement PeopleSoft, as sources from which the board might fund the pay raises.

     But board chair Grace Fey said funding the contracts could have necessitated as many as 750 layoffs throughout the system. "To have additional layoffs at this point would have been devastating for us. I wish I didn't have to choose, but the situation in the state ... is completely dire."

     Fey, who is executive vice president and director of Frontier Capital Management Company, said she has reason to hope the state's economy will recover in the next few years. "Our intention ... is to fund the contracts ... as soon as we can financially when the state recovers - and it will," said Fey.

     Union leaders reacted angrily last week after Swift vetoed $24.1 million to fund the first year of the three-year bargaining agreements and the House failed to take an override vote. Several campus union leaders faulted President William M. Bulger for not lobbying House Speaker Thomas Finneran to restore the one-time contract funding.
As Swift trimmed state spending by $355 million, she also reduced the University system's main appropriation by $3.5 million to $445,587,750, a cut of $15 million or 3.3 percent from last year.

     Meanwhile, Swift also eliminated $1.36 million from the state college sector and $270,000 from the community college system. Combined with reductions previously approved by the Legislature, the state colleges are down $2.5 million or 1.3 percent from last year, while the community colleges have lost $6.7 million or 2.9 percent from FY02.
A bid by Swift to impose a tiered system of public employee health insurance contributions was rejected by lawmakers. Under Swift's plan, the share paid by state employees would have ranged from the current 15 percent up to 25 percent, depending on their salary. Legislators overrode Swift so that the state is continuing to pay 85 percent of insurance costs.

     The governor also reduced funding for the library materials reserve for higher education by $1.2 million, leaving $1.2 million to be shared among the state college, community college and University systems - a cut of 76 percent from last year's appropriation of $5 million. Two years ago, library materials received $14 million in funding. Since the University system usually receives about 60-65 percent of the reserve, the loss will be felt on the campuses.

     Scholarship funding was cut by $1.5 million from last year, but the nearly $9.7 million earmarked for the University system was not affected.

     Swift did not make any changes in the endowed faculty chair program, funded at $2 million, or Commonwealth College, level-funded at last year's figure of $1.715 million.