UPDATED: UC announces agreement with CUE on temporary layoffs

by Dave Jones
December 11, 2009

The Coalition of University Employees, representing some 14,000 clerical workers in the UC system, has agreed to temporary layoffs to help the university with its 2009-10 budget shortfall, according to a Dec. 10 announcement from the UC Office of the President.

Under the agreement, CUE members will take 11 to 16 days off without pay, corresponding to pay cuts of 4 percent to 6 percent.

CUE members at UC Davis had faced the prospect of using vacation time or compensatory time during the Dec. 28-30 campus closure; now, with the union's agreement with UC, the campus's CUE members can treat this closure as a layoff period. Similarly, employees subject to the furlough plan are counting the Dec. 28-30 closure as three furlough days.

In another similarity, the CUE agreement provides for equal pay reductions from employee checks over 12 months, starting Feb. 1. Employees who choose this option will retain vacation and sick leave accruals.

“The university appreciates CUE’s willingness to craft an agreement that recognizes the university’s need to conserve funds during a time of fiscal crisis,” said Peter Chester, senior university negotiator assigned to clerical unit negotiations. “This deal also mitigates the financial hardship of the cuts on the university’s clerical employees.”

In allocating pay cuts, the university is using a sliding scale — the more you make, the bigger your cut. The CUE agreement specifies three pay bands:

• Annual salary $40,000 or less — 4 percent (11 days)

• Annual salary $40,001-50,000 — 5 percent (13 days)

• Annual salary $50,001 or more — 6 percent (16 days)

The furlough-salary reduction program, already in place for faculty and nonrepresented staff, also uses a sliding scale; it consists of seven pay bands, ranging from $40,000 or less to $240,000 and above, corresponding to pay cuts of 4 percent to 10 percent and 11 to 26 furlough days. See the chart here. The differences between this chart and the CUE chart are in the second and third pay bands: Under the furlough-salary reduction program, the second pay band ranges from $40,001 to $46,000 (5 percent, 13 days) and the third pay band ranges from $46,001 to $60,000 (6 percent, 16 days).

7 campus closure days

UC Davis has scheduled two other campus closures: March 24-25 and June 14-15. Counting the Dec. 28-30 closure, there are seven closure days in all. Employees must have supervisory approval for their scheduling of their remaining furlough or temporary layoff days. (See separate story on the closure plan.)

The university cannot order furloughs for represented employees without approval of their unions — and several unions have not agreed. Nevertheless, the university intends to generate payroll savings in an amount equal to what the furlough program would bring. To do this, UC Davis ordered temporary layoffs or reductions in time, to be scheduled Feb. 1 or later.

CUE members will still be getting temporary layoffs, but the agreement pushes up the effective date — so that CUE members can take a three-day temporary layoff during the campus's Dec. 28-30 closure.

Their only other alternatives: use vacation time or comp time or unpaid leave, or talk with their supervisors about alternative work arrangements.

These options still apply to members of other unions that have not agreed to the furlough plan or some other way to generate an equal amount of payroll savings.

The systemwide furlough program, approved by the Board of Regents in July, is designed to save $184 million. Altogether, the university is using salary reductions, spending cuts, debt restructuring and student fee increases to offset the loss of more than $800 million in state funding.