Hundreds of faculty members at San Francisco State University joined the picket line today alongside three other California State universities in a statewide strike to demand a better union contract.
“Fight back! Fight back!” Charles Toombs chanted with hundreds in red T-shirts outside the university’s campus at 19th and Holloway avenues.
Toombs is the president of the California Faculty Association, which represents some 29,000 lecturers, professors, coaches and faculty across the state. “And you know, if they don’t get the message this week, we’re going to give them a louder and larger message in January,” he said.
Strikes have been taking place this week at four of the largest of the system’s 23 campuses — at Cal Poly Pomona yesterday, San Francisco State today, Cal State Los Angeles tomorrow, and Sacramento State on Thursday. The union is threatening a more extensive strike in January if workers don’t receive a “reasonable offer,” according to Toombs.
“Some of the other campuses weren’t ready yet. They’ll be ready in January. So we’re ready, if we need, to take the whole system out in January, and to take it out for longer,” said Brad Erickson, president of CFA’s San Francisco State chapter.
The main sticking point between the union and CSU is over economic proposals. While CSU has offered a 15-percent increase over three years, the union is demanding a 12-percent pay raise for this year, retroactive to the summer, to keep ahead of inflation.
“The 15-percent increase over three years that the CSU proposes is more fiscally prudent than the 12 percent that CFA is asking for,” CSU Office of the Chancellor said in a statement, which emphasized the need to find “a way that is fiscally sustainable for the system.”
“CSU is prepared to get back to the bargaining table, and hopes to find common ground with CFA to provide salary increases for our faculty. We believe that issues should be resolved through bargaining,” said the statement.
The union is also demanding raising the base salary for the lowest-paid faculty, from $54,000 to $64,000. The situation concerns more than a thousand faculty members, and is even more critical for those who work at the San Francisco campus, according to Erickson. “The faculty at this campus are at the rock-bottom of the pay-to-housing-cost ratio, because the housing cost is the most expensive here,” he said.
California State University has “offered nothing about raising the floor. And this is a non-starter. We will not sign a contract that doesn’t raise the floor,” said Erickson.
Other divisive issues include additional counselors and gender-neutral restrooms, expanded paid parental leave, manageable workloads, and safety protocols for faculty interaction with campus police.
Administration of San Francisco State University is aware of a number of classes that were canceled or made remote today as a result of the strike, but the exact number was unknown. In a statement, the university said that “The university remains open during this time as we continue to prioritize students’ learning and progress toward graduation.”
“All labor negotiations are handled centrally at the CSU Chancellor’s office. We remain hopeful that the CSU reaches an agreement with the CFA, as they have done with other unions,” said the university.
Also joining the picket line were San Francisco State students; Teamsters Local 2010, which represents skilled trades workers at the CSU; and faculty who traveled from other campuses. The presence of the Rockin’ Solidarity Labor Chorus, a chorus made up of union workers, brought a moment of calm.
“So, come on everybody, grab a sign, and don’t you cross that picket line! We be marching, we’re marching in the streets,” they sang.
The World Socialist Web Site points out today that these limited strikes follow UAW president Shawn Fain’s bureaucratic playbook to isolate workers and police them.
The era when unions truly defended workers is long gone. Today, negotiations typically take place behind closed doors and their “historic” results are announced before workers ever know what happened or can vote.
See: https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/12/06/gdfa-d06.html