UC Patient Care Workers Win!
November 21, 2008
DEMANDING A FAIR CONTRACT – University of California/Davis employees – members of Local 3299 – demonstrate with supporters in April. (Photo credit: Israel Alvaran)
After a year-long struggle for justice, 11,500 patient care workers at the University of California – members of AFSCME Local 3299 – have overwhelmingly ratified an agreement on a five-year contract that raises wages an average of 4 percent annually and achieves many other hard-fought goals.
The pact – retroactive to October 2007 – covers licensed vocational nurses, respiratory therapists and other patient care workers at UC’s five medical centers. It will raise wages by about 20 percent over five years. It establishes at all UC campuses the first-ever statewide minimum wage of $14.50 per hour by the end of the contract period.
Workers also will be able to bargain collectively on pension and health care benefits for the first time, and they will receive a guaranteed longevity based step system, which rewards workers for their experience and skills.
“Winning this historic contract has been a long and hard fight for all of our 20,000-plus members,” says Local 3299 Pres. Lakesha Harrison, a licensed vocational nurse at Santa Monica/UCLA Medical Center and an AFSCME International vice president. “Reaching this agreement with the university clearly shows that the concerns expressed by our membership about their working conditions were true and needed to be addressed.”
However, another 8,500 service workers – custodians, groundskeepers and food service workers who are employed throughout the 10-campus system – are still fighting for justice.
“Service workers deserve the same rights as patient care workers,” says Jeff Myers, a surgical technician at UC/San Francisco and a vice president of patient care for Local 3299. “It is shameful that the University of California pays such low wages to their service workers that 96 percent of them qualify for at least one form of public assistance.”
Members of Local 3299 have been fighting for justice since early last year. This April – on the 40th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s historic “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech – thousands marked their struggle by demonstrating at campuses in San Francisco and Los Angeles. In July, the service workers held a five-day strike for a fair contract and an end to poverty wages. To learn more, watch this video.
For more details of the proposed agreement, read this summary from Local 3299 (PDF).
Also, check out news coverage in the San Francisco Chronicle and UCLA’s The Daily Bruin.
