Contract talks resume Monday, Sept. 19, between the University of Minnesota and AFSCME locals representing 3,300 clerical, technical and health care workers.

Union members conducted informational picketing Friday in front of several campus buildings in Minneapolis and St. Paul. They say they are frustrated by unequal treatment from the university administration.

AFSCME workers, coming off contracts with no across-the-board raises and significant increases in health-care costs, want to recoup some of their losses, said Candace Lund, president of Local 3937. But the university administration is offering annual raises of only 1.5 percent, despite giving civil service workers at the university raises of 3 percent earlier this year.

The university administration maintains that, with step increases, AFSCME-represented workers would actually receive a 3.5 percent wage increase. "The university's position is that the current AFSCME proposal is extremely unrealistic given our financial situation, is not fair or equitable with other employee groups, and does not allow for proper stewardship of taxpayer dollars," the administration said.

However, AFSCME members cite other examples of unequal treatment of the university's unionized workforce, which is primarily female and primarily in lower-wage jobs.

For example, although faculty members get six weeks of paid parental leave, the administration refuses to give clerical, technical and health-care workers more than two weeks. "We want parity on that," said Gladys McKenzie, AFSCME Council 5 business agent and chief negotiator for Locals 3260, 3800, 3801 and 3927. "We point out we?re not biologically different and our children aren?t biologically different."

The administration also continues to reject union proposals that would make it easier for workers to transfer from one department to another and to pursue different jobs elsewhere on campus.

"We want to make it possible for individuals to move about the university without being on perpetual probation," said McKenzie. Instead, the administration not only strips seniority and puts workers back on probation each time they change departments, "they told us they view it as a risk to hire from within," she said.

Opposing 'divisive' health plan
The administration also wants to change its health insurance ? creating a four-tier system to replace the current two-tier system. The AFSCME locals oppose the change.

Although some workers without children could save money, Lund said, the four-tier system increases costs for traditional family coverage by as much as 36 percent, or roughly $78 a month.

"It's an evil proposal that pits workers against each other," she said. "We don't support any kind of a divisive proposal like that, that pits one type of family against another."

As a counter-proposal, AFSCME wants health-insurance premiums set as a percentage of income, rather than a flat rate. If everybody pays the same percentage, Lund said, it eliminates the disproportionate impact that current premiums have on lower-wage workers.

The talks are being conducted with the help of a mediator from the state Bureau of Mediation Services.

This article is adapted and updated from one that originally appeared in the St. Paul Union Advocate.