April 12, 2021
The Honorable Jim Cooper, Chair
Assembly Public Employment and Retirement Committee
1020 N Street, Room 153
Sacramento, CA 95814
RE: Assembly Bill 1550 (Rivas) Position: Support
Dear Assemblymember Cooper:
The Council of UC Faculty Associations supports Assembly Bill 1550 (Rivas). It would protect faculty bargaining rights by allowing faculty who are currently in a bargaining unit to remain eligible for union representation if the University of California moves their positions into the Academic Senate.
Three years ago, at the request of the University of California Office of the President (UCOP), the University of California Board of Regents moved six part-time faculty job classifications for lecturers, actively covered by a collective bargaining agreement, into the Academic Senate. Current HEERA rules caused those job classifications to lose their union representation.
Though the classifications were vacant at the time of the move, this has set a dangerous precedent. Workers will lose union representation if the University of California unilaterally moves represented positions into the Academic Senate.
If this precedent stands, it could allow the University of California to engage in union busting. For instance, the University of California could seek to sideline individual labor leaders among their faculty simply by moving their job classification to the Academic Senate and thereby eliminating their union representation. The UC could also seek to eliminate an entire bargaining unit by moving all of its constituent faculty job titles to the Academic Senate.
AB 1550 (Rivas) would protect the bargaining rights of University of California employees by ensuring that any workers in a union-represented job classification who are moved to the Academic Senate keep their represented status. It would also prohibit UC from creating new job classifications within the Academic Senate with duties and functions that are substantially similar to existing classifications that are currently eligible for union representation. The bill does nothing to change the University of California’s authority to move existing job titles into the academic senate but simply establishes that workers retain their union representation if they are subject to such a move.
For these reasons, we urge an “AYE” vote on AB 1550 (Rivas) when it comes before you in Assembly Public Employment and Retirement Committee.
Sincerely,
Constance Penley,
President, Council of UC Faculty Associations
and Professor of Film and Media Studies, UCSB
Wendy Matsumura
Vice President, Council of UC Faculty Associations
and Associate Professor of History, UCSD
cc: Committee Members
Assemblymember Luz Rivas
Even were this bill to pass, it is not clear what would happen with regard to pay and benefits and other conditions of work – which is what unions bargain about. The individual whose status is changed to an Academic Senate member would presumably be outside the bargaining unit to which the union’s contract applies. For example, grievance procedures are different for Academic Senate members than for non-members. Nothing in current law prevents an Academic Senate member from retaining membership in, or joining, any union – whether or not that union has representation rights in a particular unit.