By Conrad Scott-Curtis
CCFT and the District are currently in negotiations over compensation for the coming academic year, 2015-16.
Timing
This year we face particular challenges to finishing negotiations by the end of the school year and getting a tentative agreement to membership for ratification before summer: these include the historically early end of the semester, and that timing as it is related to the governor’s May 14 revise to the January budget proposal. These circumstances leave us with a very narrow window to finish up a tentative agreement and get it to you for a vote before the end of finals week.
Goals
Our most basic, but certainly not our only, goal is to make this year’s one-time raise an ongoing raise. Recall that for 2014-15,
- faculty received an overall raise of 1.63%; of this, 0.5% was ongoing, and 1.13% was one-time.
- adjunct faculty received an increase in pro-rata; of that the ongoing rate raised from 63% to 63.8%, and an increase to 64.3% was one-time
(We also have goals of increasing salary further and advancing the adjunct pro-rata rate.)
Possible Effects
If, by the end of this school year, we are not able to reach the best possible package, these one-time raises would go away, temporarily: August paychecks would show a decrease of 1.13% across-the-board, and the adjunct pro-rata rate would decrease from 64.3% to 63.8%. In that case, we would extend negotiations into the fall, and any package we agreed to then would include a retroactive restoration of these funds.
Everyone should be aware of a possible drop in August paychecks.
Notes on Campus Climate
In addition, I want to note a general sentiment on campus regarding salary advance: Cabrillo faculty have been patient over the last years during the budget challenges, but I am hearing more and more that patience is not a limitless resource.
Cabrillo’s salary in Column 6 (the highest non-doctorate category) ranks between 49th and 59th out of 72 in the state, depending on step (source: Santa Rosa Junior College Faculty Association Annual Study for 2014-15). We juxtapose this decline with the fact that the state budget for community colleges is the best we have seen in years.
We acknowledge that there are challenges down the road, including
- Cabrillo’s plans for a lower cap in 2016-17,
- mandated increases in District contributions to faculty and staff retirement programs
- and the sunsetting of Prop 30 at the end of 2019.
We do not dismiss these very real challenges. However, we are also aware that
- We do not know the degree of reduction in enrollment we will experience in 2016-17
- For the past two years, the state has made money available to help districts reach their increased retirement contributions
- Grassroots and political wheels are in motion to extend the taxes put in place by Prop 30.
We understand that CCFT’s perspective on these issues is different from the District’s. We acknowledge that no one knows the future, but we do know that over the past ten years, Cabrillo salaries have fallen precipitously in comparison to other schools.
The situation CCFT faces is not an easy one, but the District also has an interest in seeing salaries rise to be more in line with others in the region and in the state. Cabrillo, after all, has a tradition of excellence and an interest in attracting the best talent.
In a climate that continues to be challenging, CCFT acknowledges a legitimate mood of accommodation-fatigue among faculty and is committed to the best possible package we can achieve both for the upcoming year, and in next year’s negotiations when the entire three-year contract will be open for negotiation.