Bargaining Update

Today, the Student Workers of Columbia union (SWC) refused to bargain at an eighth consecutive scheduled bargaining session after agreeing to meet in person on October 6 at 11:00am at The Interchurch Center, a neutral off-campus location.

SWC did not attend today’s scheduled bargaining session at Interchurch to bargain. Instead, a union delegation of approximately 30 individuals arrived at Interchurch approximately an hour after the scheduled start time and refused to join the University’s bargaining team in the room that had been reserved to bargain or to discuss logistics for future negotiations. The union asked to use the room for an internal caucus to determine if they could discuss anything at all with the University’s bargaining committee. After a few minutes, the SWC bargaining committee informed the University it had no authority to bargain or discuss logistics but was present only to “hand over” a one-page list of “demands” and three related contract article proposals, most of which deal with topics outside the scope of terms and conditions of employment that labor contracts appropriately address and instead relate to student, academic, and operational matters within the University’s exclusive authority. 

Among the items listed, in the union’s words, were:

• Eliminate Public Safety’s power to harm our community
• Re-establish Columbia as a “Sanctuary Campus”
• Stop surveillance
• Get cops off campus and stop Columbia from collaborating with them

SWC repeatedly insisted that the University had canceled the bargaining session, even though SWC found the University’s team at the scheduled bargaining location, where the University had been waiting since the scheduled start time and remained ready to bargain. The University team asked the union multiple times to stay and negotiate, or at least schedule future sessions, but the union refused and said the University should respond to them by email. 

During these interactions, several SWC attendees were holding up phones to record in a continuation of their practice in the failed first bargaining session in March. 

The University did not cancel the October 6 bargaining session and remains ready to meet, as it has been for months, to engage substantively and productively on a successor contract. And while the University is open to a reasonable number of in-person observers, a reasonable number is not unlimited and does not reach the large numbers the union contends must be accommodated. As past experience from our first and only bargaining session in March has shown, dozens or hundreds of observers is not conducive to bargaining, which is why that does not align with how other unions conduct negotiations.

Even before refusing to bargain at today’s scheduled bargaining session, SWC publicly presented a false and incomplete account of events leading up to today. Here are the facts:

• On August 23, SWC confirmed its agreement to bargain on September 11 at The Interchurch Center, and, on September 5, the University reserved space there for September 11.
• On September 8, SWC canceled, without explanation, the agreed-upon bargaining session scheduled for September 11. The next day, the University offered three new dates for in-person bargaining at Interchurch.
• On September 30, SWC confirmed it was available to meet on October 6 at 11:00am at Interchurch without virtual broadcasting/Zoom and requested its preferred rooms at Interchurch (Sockman Lounge or the Chapel).
• On October 1, The University confirmed October 6 at 11:00am for bargaining at Interchurch without virtual broadcasting/Zoom. It informed SWC that the union’s preferred rooms were not available, so the University had reserved the only space Interchurch said would be available for the entire time period needed for a bargaining session (the Robing Room), which comfortably could accommodate 40-50 people. The University asked the union to provide the names of its bargaining committee members and observers by October 3 for admittance purposes.
• SWC responded late on October 1 that the Robing Room would not have sufficient capacity for the number of observers it planned to bring and asked the University to provide a list of dates in October, November, and December that both Sockman Lounge and the University are available, expressing the union’s preference for Fridays. On October 2, SWC offered Trinity Lutheran Church as an alternative venue for the October 6 session.
• The union has criticized the University for being unresponsive over these days but neglected to note that these emails were sent over Yom Kippur, the most solemn day on the Jewish calendar.
• On October 3, the University responded that the Robing Room at Interchurch is an appropriate space that could accommodate a reasonable number of observers and that the alternative location the union suggested is not an appropriate space to conduct contract bargaining. Trinity Lutheran Church is open to the public and, thus, vulnerable to disruptions to the negotiations. The University suggested that, if the union did not want to proceed in the Robing Room at Interchurch, the parties’ bargaining committees meet there at the agreed time on October 6 to discuss future bargaining logistics and dates. The University did not cancel the session.
• Over the weekend of October 4 and 5, before responding to the University, SWC initiated a campaign on social media and through emails to faculty to falsely accuse the University of canceling the October 6 bargaining session and ignoring the union’s efforts to schedule negotiations. The union repeatedly posted the phone number and email address of a senior member of the University’s labor and employee relations team and encouraged supporters to contact her to pressure the University to meet at Trinity Lutheran Church. At 8:27pm on October 5, SWC responded to the University expressing similar themes as in their online campaign.
• Late in the evening of October 5, the University replied to SWC to respond to the union’s false accusations and urge the union to attend the October 6 meeting, as scheduled. The text of the University’s response is available here.

To be clear, the University did not object to the union’s proposed alternative location because it is a faith-based space. The Interchurch Center, which the University had proposed and where the parties had agreed to meet, is also a faith-based space. The University does seek, however, an appropriate, secure space where constructive negotiations can take place. 

SWC is continuing to raise process-focused distractions as a pretext for avoiding negotiating in good faith on the terms and conditions of employment that affect all our student employees. Although it is commendable that SWC, at least for today, has relaxed its demand for Zoom broadcasting as a precondition to bargaining, the University is disappointed that the union has replaced this with an insistence that it only will bargain if it can bring dozens to hundreds of observers.

The University is open to considering for future bargaining sessions larger spaces available at Interchurch as well as spaces at Studebaker and other campus locations, provided they are appropriate for contract discussions. The University’s goal is still to work with SWC toward a fair, competitive, and sustainable contract that serves student employees and our broader community. We hope SWC will meet us at the bargaining table as soon as possible, prepared to engage constructively and in good faith on the employment-related topics that are central to a labor contract and the wellbeing of the student employees it represents.