Union leaders call it progress. But in the never-ending cycle of contract negotiations between the University of Maine system and its professional staff, an agreement may simply mark the beginning of the next disagreement.
Members of the University of Maine Professional Staff Association (UMPSA) will vote this week on a tentative agreement reached between UMPSA and UMS. The agreement, reached after over a year and half of negotiations, contains several key concessions that make its approval by union members likely, according to UMPSA leader Casandra Fitzherbert. The contract would be in effect only until June 30 of this year. The current contract should have taken effect nearly two years ago. Union and UMS officials are already preparing for the next round of negotiations.
The agreement details over 20 changes to the professional staff’s contract. Among the most important is language that commits the University to implementing a salary structure, according to Fitzherbert, who called the provision a “deal maker.”
The new salary structure would bring order to the University’s current system, which pays some long-time workers scarcely more than new hires. The agreement calls for salary structure negotiations to begin in the summer of 2002.
The agreement also calls for a pay increase. Negotiations had previously been deadlocked over union demands for an 8.5 percent raise, with the University offering a 7.5 percent increase. Under the terms of the agreement the University will add an additional one half percent to its offer. The additional $121,000 will be dedicated to alleviating salary inequities within the University system.
Despite the progress, the next round of negotiations is likely to be as contentious as the last when additional salary increases and changes to the health insurance program are discussed, according to Fitzherbert.
Rank and file union members are relieved to see the current round of negotiations end, according to Carol Chipman, coordinator of the Cooperative Education Program.
“People are sort of tired of it. They’re just tired, tired, tired,” said Chipman.
Susie Bock, head of Special Collections and Archives for the University Libraries, is ready for the cycle to continue.
“I think the University has spent years battering us back and making us cave in,” said Bock. “The things we didn’t get this time we’ll demand the next time.”
Staff Writer John McCarthy can be contacted at: [email protected]