Bargaining Session 8/30/22

The NULWU bargaining team, along with a representative from SEIU Local 73, had another bargaining session with management on 8/30/2022. We presented four counterproposals to the university team:

  • Union Membership

  • Equal Employment, Opportunity, and Non-Discrimination

  • No Strike No Lockout

  • Layoffs and Furloughs


The University bargaining team countered these proposals and added a proposal on Severability that had been overlooked in past sessions. No tentative agreements were reached during this session.


We continued to have a lively dialogue over No Strike No Lockout. While we agree that during the terms of the contract Represented Workers will not strike or engage in activities that amount to a stoppage of work, the issue of whether Represented Workers can demonstrate support for other labor groups on campus during non-work hours, such as a lunch break or after work, is still up in the air. We have been advocating for our right to engage in this activity, because we feel very strongly about our right to do so. With each session, we have made progress on this proposal, and we hope that we will be able to resolve our differences soon.


We also presented a counterproposal to the University on their Layoffs and Furloughs proposal. This proposal is very important to our members, because the University furloughed ¼ of library staff in 2020, eventually laying off two staff members. Our counter proposes seniority as the method for determining the order of layoff or furlough, because we believe it is the most transparent and neutral tool available for making such a determination. We feel very strongly that using seniority as a determining factor will be a bulwark against an otherwise opaque process that relies on management’s highly subjective evaluations of an employee’s performance, abilities, and skills. The University countered, and we are glad to see them engage to some degree on seniority, but we are still very far apart in other respects. As with No Strikes No Lockout, every discussion gets us closer to agreement, but we’re not where we want to be quite yet!


As always, we ask that you continue to show your support for our union by wearing buttons and changing Zoom backgrounds to our union logo. The stronger the union, the better the contract! Make sure to follow us on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to keep up with the latest updates.

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