In attendance: Thomas Morrill, Kris Osterloh, Clint Mattox, Zhian Kamvar, Chris Mihiar; Ashley Bromley, Angela McClendon
Meeting called to order at 5:12 PM
Minutes from 5-3-2016 – Approved.
Email Decisions – (1) Approved all-member email about bargaining, new stewards, and Howard Bunsis follow-up Q&A session. (2) Agreed to contact additional back-charged fee payer about reimbursement for back charges.
Hiring Process – Angela’s last day at CGE will be May 31. Chris feels that having a well-done hiring process is more important than an immediate hire, and he is willing to make sure vital bills get paid during June so the hiring committee has time to make a great choice. (Angela and Chris will spend some time going through the spreadsheets and stuff.) Stephanie may not be available for a few days, but the rest of the affirmative action committee will get the policy finalized by our next EC meeting (May 17). Thomas, Chris, and Clint will be the EC members on the HC; Chris initially didn’t want to chair the committee but then he started chairing it. Tonight, Thomas will draft an email to the stewards to look for 3-4 more HC members. The HC will meet next Wednesday, May 18, with the goal of preparing the job announcement for posting and setting the hiring timeline.
Deduction Issue Update – For Monday’s bargaining session, we had been asked to bring our language for the Union Rights article, and we included an update to clarify what happens when grad employees aren’t charged fair share/dues for months they were employed in the BU. The contract states that one month missed due to employment adjustments in the first four weeks of a term should have back-charged dues divided over the next two months’ paychecks. CGE would like to add language that if more than one month is missed, the university alone will bear the cost of remitting dues to CGE. Thomas and Ashley are meeting with Viki tomorrow to talk more about it. They will ask her to agree to remedy the situation by reimbursing us for reimbursing the grads. If she doesn’t agree, we will have a grievance prepared to hand her. Angela will provide check copies for the deductions we reimbursed last month.
We pause to celebrate Thomas’s birthday!
Timesheet Concerns – Clint has been hearing complaints from grads in his program (and feels the same way himself) that they’re uncomfortable filling out the EmpCenter sick leave/substitute timesheets when the form seems to say you’re certifying having worked 0 hours. Clint would like it if the language in EmpCenter was clearer that you’re only certifying having 0 hours of substitution or leave. Thomas and Ashley are already working with HR to improve the clarity of emails that go out to grads prompting them to fill in their sick/sub hours. They will bring this up with Viki tomorrow as well.
Solidarity Fair – This is the Saturday after next, May 21. CGE will bring a few tables and canopies (that we’ve been borrowing from AFT-OR). Our interactive feature will be related to the signs people are making about why they support a #FAIRER contract. We’ll also have button-making supplies. Thomas plans to be at the table. CGE will also provide lunch – we’ll do Yumm bowls again! Zhian, Clint, and Vance will cook. Turnout: Ashley already created an event on fb that we’ll invite all our friends to. Clint will send Social List emails on Tuesday and Friday, and we’ll include it in any all-member emails we send out between now and then.
Strategic Retreat House – Ashley has been doing a lot of shopping. She emailed the EC a couple different options that should meet our needs pretty well, one in Waldport and one in Lincoln City. The EC votes for Option 1 (Waldport), waiting on the family house suboption until we have a better idea of how many people will need it.
Bargaining – We’ve gotten more sessions! We’re now bargaining every remaining Monday and Friday of the term except for Memorial Day.
- Update: We met this last Monday at a last-minute scheduled session. CGE brought the admin team several proposals and “they hated each one more than the last.” It will be interesting to see how they come back at tomorrow’s session.
- Turnout: We’ve been seeing lower turnout than we’d like. If we want to ratify a contract in spring term, we’re going to need more support at sessions from the membership. Kris will send an email to the stewards to get them to the next sessions on Friday the 13th and Monday the 16th. When new stewards take office on the 16th, we’ll ask them to start turning out their areas.
- Action: At the Steward Council meeting this last Tuesday, we took pictures of folks holding the signs where they’d written why they’re part of CGE for a #FAIRER OSU. We’ll stick them up on the walls of the bargaining room tomorrow. Officers will take blank signs to their departments to ask other members to write one and get a photo for future sessions.
Ed Ray Meeting – The spring term meeting is next Wednesday, May 18 at 10 AM. Kris, Thomas, Zhian, and NAME will attend. Ashley suggests talking about opening up the grad employee PacificSource insurance to international students who are on support from their countries, similar to how students on fellowships are able to use it. Kris would like to add an update on field safety protocols. Another question to bring up will be the replacement timeline for several university admins who have left. We’ll email out the meeting agenda on Monday.
Steward Council Debrief – The meeting was pretty successful. Kris was quite impressed with the potato bar dinner. Every potato was perfectly done. Ashley was impressed by the number of people she didn’t know – lots of new members getting involved!
Trivia Night Debrief – It was fun. Turnout was low (partly because of some other social events conflicting), but the folks who were there had a good time!
Bunsis Event Debrief – There was a follow-up meeting and Q&A video session yesterday evening. None of us attended, but Ashley got a report back, which she’ll email to the EC list. About 25 people attended and the event organizers felt like it went well.
Ink Refill – Ashley has found that we’re getting low on black ink. The EC approves her buying more ink.
Thirsty Third Thursday – We’re doing this again next week, on May 19. Ashley will be in charge of turnout because she’s just so dang good at it.
Meeting adjourned at 7:17 PM