FAM-L Bargaining, Day 14

Librarians closed our contract today!

Today ended in victory for librarians – and your presence at the negotiations made a difference! 

In a room packed with faculty and librarians, we won a tentative agreement on our second librarian contract. While we had to make some concessions to get to this point, we gained improvements in a handful of key areas:

• On Compensation, we won better raises than in our first librarian contract, which means more money in our pockets. We also negotiated an increase in promotional bumps for both promotion points: $6,500 for promotion to Associate and $9,500 for promotion to Principal (that’s a $500 increase for both). 
• On Professional Development, we got management to agree to increase the PD funds available to our members. This will reduce out-of-pocket costs for our members who attend and present at conferences and other PD activities.
• On Association Rights, we successfully pushed management to abandon their attempt to close librarian bargaining sessions for all future contracts. This means that our members will NOT be barred from attending negotiations in the future, which means that management has to face you when they share their bargaining positions. They can’t hide behind closed doors. As a member-led union, FAM is committed to transparent, open bargaining and member participation. 

These victories come on a day when you showed up for the team and packed the negotiating room. Every time we’ve had a packed room, management has made concessions and we have  made progress. 

Librarians: stay tuned for an announcement about a librarian-member meeting(s) and overview of the ratification process. Also, faculty negotiations are still your fight, since we are still trying to get management to agree to reasonable Benefits language for both units. 

Faculty: we’re still fighting for our contract, especially around Compensation and Benefits — and management is stalling and refusing to make progress. We still need your help! 

Actions you can take to win YOUR contract!!

• Attend upcoming faculty bargaining sessions in July — as you can see, your attendance matters! Stay tuned for confirmed bargaining dates. 
• While you’re there, grab a FAIR CONTRACT NOW yard sign, post it in your yard, and send a picture to info@famiami.org!
• Stay tuned for information on our upcoming FAM Retreat, where we will celebrate and strategize for these contracts and beyond. 

Until faculty close our contract, all of our first contract protections stay in place. 

Solidarity,
Your FAM Negotiating Team