[OccupyCU] FW: [Campuslabor] AFSCME 698/3700 Rally Monday April 30th noon ~ 12:30 on Quad outside H AB

[Ricky Baldwin]

Sisters and Brothers,

This is a time for solidarity, for standing together, fighting together, speaking out together.  The UofI is increasingly run as a private institution (on public land, with public subsidy) for the well-to-do who wish to attend a school geared to their interests.  Its mission of "Labor and Learning" is increasingly overshadowed by top-down administrations interested in a well-funded privatizing, union-busting, corporate-serving draining away of community and public resources to feed private greed.

One aspect of this we see repeated over and over when unions of UI workers go into negotiations with the UofI.  It is the blatant disregard for labor law, worker rights and economic justice, as well as common decency and professionalism.  What we see at the bargaining table are often very well paid and equally immature brats, kicking sand, hoarding, whining and throwing tantrums when others do not bow and scrape and give them everything they want.  This is just another example.  Our AFSCME sisters and brothers have been negotiating now several months in good faith over non-monetary issues.  But as soon as negotiations reached the point of discussing money-related issues, negotiators on behalf of this multi-billion-dollar institution began canceling scheduled meetings - the last three in a row, in fact.  Most recently, the bosses' team failed even to notify the workers' team of the cancellation, even though the entire bosses' team, the building management at the site of the scheduled meeting, and just about everyone else EXCEPT the workers were notified.  Rude and childish, perhaps, but is this avoidance the result of an embarrassing lack of funds to talk about?

No.  The UofI operating budget increases every year.  Tuition increases every year.  Student fees, room and board, parking rates and fines, almost every means of intake on the campuses continue to increase with voracious regularity.  Revenue exceeds expenses by many millions of dollars. The UI Foundation continues raising billions on behalf of the University, whose bond rating remains very strong regardless of administrators' pitiful cries of poverty.  The UofI Administration continues to grow, and their salaries continue to grow - in fact the number of disgraced former presidents and chancellors forced to resign in scandal continues to grow - amid their calls for austerity and "shared sacrifice" (for everybody else).  No, they have money.  They just don't want to share it with the people who make the University tick: students, professors and graduate employees, academic professionals, technicians, custodians, mail carriers, cooks, clerks, store keepers, secretaries, linen maids, floor sweepers and moppers, garbage can emptiers, floor waxers, electricians, carpenters, plumbers, and all manner of workers.

So we have to band together and stay together and say to the University administrators that they need us more than we need them, that our work is what keeps the University going, that it is after all our University, and in fact we are the University.  And we are not going to stand for this wasteful, greedy, disrespectful, reckless nonsense.

That means we will show up when we can, and find someone to take our place when we cannot, and bring someone new each time.

This time its:

12noon
Monday April 30
Quad

See below.

Love and Solidarity,
Ricky

Ricky Baldwin
Senior Field Organizer
SEIU Local 73
1606 Willow View Rd. #2A
Urbana IL 61802
217-328-7509
www.seiu73.org
________________________________________
From: campuslabor-bounces at lists.uigeo.org [campuslabor-bounces at lists.uigeo.org] On Behalf Of axxdorn at juno.com [axxdorn at juno.com]
Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2012 4:39 PM
To: campuslabor at lists.uigeo.org
Subject: [Campuslabor] AFSCME 698/3700 Rally Monday April 30th noon ~ 12:30     on Quad outside H       AB

University of Illinois AFSCME 698 and AFSCME 3700 showed up for negotiations this
morning as scheduled.  Management was a no show....and they forgot to tell us!  As you
can see in the video posted on our facebook pages, our team was there but there was not
one person sitting on managements side (Tara, our negotiator took advantage and used
their table for a seat).  The locals negotiating teams delivered a letter to Chancellor
Wise at noon to express our concern.  This was the third consecutive session the U of I
cancelled.  On the 60th anniversary of Administrative Professionals Day her office closed
to take their staff to an extended lunch!  At least some of the Administrative
Professionals on campus got shown some respect!  We did leave the letter with Michael
Anderchak to give to her upon her return.

What's next?  A rally on the U of I Quad outside Henry Administration, noon - 12:30ish,
Monday, April 30th, 2012.  We will meet at this location and then at 12:15 we will march
to the Alma Mater where we will remind the U of I that the university moto is "Labor
and Learning".  Come out and march with us and help us show the U of I that the one
of twins that stand with the Alma Mater represents Labor and that organized labor on this
campus is not going away!

Hope to see you there!

Dorinda Miller
AFSCME 3700

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