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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, February 27, 2008
Nicole Savickas (510) 287-3356
nicole.savickas@ucop.edu

University of California officials announced today (Feb. 27) that the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees rejected a UC proposal that would have provided approximately $16 million to UC patient care employees in annualized wages and related costs and would have raised the average systemwide pay rate for these employees to $20.75 an hour.

To date, AFSCME has rejected numerous UC contract extension proposals for patient care technical and service employees amounting to more than $18 million in annualized wages and related costs.

The university's proposal was intended as a short-term solution to provide well-deserved wage increases to patient care technical employees while allowing the parties to continue to work toward their shared goal of a new contract. The proposal, which would have extended the contract through Sept. 30, 2008, left health and welfare benefits, retirement benefits, and current parking rates untouched, while offering the following wage increases:

At a mediation session on Tuesday (Feb. 26), the third-party mediator indicated that he would certify the negotiations to fact-finding today. At the close of mediation, UC presented the union with its proposal for a contract extension.

In the fact-finding process, UC and AFSCME will present their respective positions on the unresolved issues to a three-member fact-finding panel. The panel will then issue recommendations for resolving the differences between the parties. At the conclusion of fact-finding, if UC and AFSCME cannot reach agreement using the fact-finder's recommendations, the recommendations become available to the public.

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