State Education Union Leaders Call on Rutgers to Respect Contracts

High Profile Public Breaches Undermine Workplace Relations Everywhere

EDISON...As one of the largest employers in the state, Rutgers University is setting a terrible precedent by withholding negotiated raises next month, according to AFT New Jersey State Federation president William Lipkin. “It hurts morale and productivity, is morally repulsive and bad for business throughout the state,” said Lipkin of Rutgers management's unilateral pay freeze. “The people hurt include janitors, secretaries and administrative workers who have not had a raise in two years and whose families may already be suffering from layoffs. Rutgers management is withholding raises that would otherwise be circulated right back into the state's economy.”

The action, announced last week by Rutgers executive vice president Dr. Phil Furmanski, freezes wages for 13,000 workers and breaks an agreement brokered last year for more than 10,000 unionized staff and faculty who agreed to defer 2009 contracted raises.

Three AFT New Jersey State Federation locals comprise 7,500 of the faculty and staff workers and AFTNJ is working with the AFL-CIO in support of the Rutgers locals. Disregarding last year's deferral agreement is particularly concerning since management modeled it after the state worker agreements that Governor Chris Christie acknowledged as legally binding.

AFT New Jersey State Federation executive vice president for higher education, Dierdre Glenn Paul, a professor at Montclair State University, questioned the discrepancy. “It is difficult to understand how management at Rutgers believes they should break a comparable agreement that the state is honoring,” said Glenn Paul. “Are Rutgers executives determined to be tougher on the unions representing their faculty and staff than the Governor?”

The AFT New Jersey State Federation is the largest higher education union in the state with more than 20,000 AFT members working at the state's nine state colleges and universities and three research institutions—NJIT, UMDNJ and Rutgers. President Lipkin demanded that Rutgers management reverse the freeze and called upon the campus unions—including AFT Rutgers faculty local Rutgers AAUP-AFT, staff local Union of Rutgers Administrators, American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) locals 888 and 1761 and International Union of Operating Engineers local 68—to work together in solidarity. “With mounting attacks on education unions from pre-kindergarten through Ph.D., it is more important than ever to stay unified in countering unfair attacks on the people who do everything from teaching to taking out the garbage in our schools and on campus. We appreciate the support from AFL-CIO and will do everything we can to help our Rutgers colleagues fight this injustice.”