October 5, 2015
Bargaining bulletin #3
Your bargaining committee met with St. Giles’ lawyer on Monday absent any representation by management. Megan remains on maternity leave, with her date of return still up in the air. As we shared a comprehensive proposal in September, a response was due from St. Giles in this meeting.
The Company lawyer offered a partial proposal featuring “non-economic terms.” Because Megan is out on maternity leave, the lawyer is not able to discuss the money items. The lawyer walked us through the proposal, which was responsive to our proposal. In many cases, it appears the Company adopted language from our proposal, but was careful to avoid such important items as definitions of “full time,” “part-time,” “fixed term” and other phrases used to describe St. Giles teachers. The lawyer agrees that there has been inconsistent use of terms to describe a teacher’s tenure with the Company. Your committee sees that even more critical work is ahead of us in the bargaining.
However, the Company did seem to agree on some important points, which we hope will make more space to discuss bringing health benefits and pay for all work to our members.
According to unit member, Tanner Stinchfield, “We’ve gotten started on a path toward seniority, hiring procedures, a grievance procedure and other union security provisions.”
Committee members also discussed the importance of making every effort to hire and promote women and minorities, as there is a perception that the majority of the more remunerative positions seem not to be assigned with that in mind.
The lawyer restated the Company’s offer to “open the books,“ and your committee stated (again) that we would like to see them. Your committee is concerned with past information that funds from the SF school were shifted to New York as stated in an all-hands meeting on July 2, 2015. A case could be made that had those funds not been shifted, the SF school would be in a stronger position to meet many if not all of the economic proposals that your committee has put forward.
The Company lawyer hopes that Megan will return to bargaining in November. Your committee has made it clear on the record that we expect St. Giles to present an alternate should Megan not be available for the next session. The parties exchanged dates for most of November and the first week of December.
Representing the bargaining team: Adam Benson, Tanner Stinchfield (sitting in for Britt Lollis) and Kat Anderson, Guild staff, with support from Jessica Mironov.
Representing the Company: Mark Ross, lawyer.
If you have any questions, please contact Shannon, Tanner, Britt, Adam, Jessica or Kat at (415) 298-1335.
