UC Berkeley News Brief

Union service workers at UC campuses return to work

| 21 July 2008

BERKELEY – Union service workers returned to work starting on Saturday (July 19) following a five-day strike at University of California campuses.

Thousands of members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), Local 3299, walked off the job on Monday, July 14, despite a court order prohibiting the planned five-day strike on grounds that inadequate notice had been given.

Last week, AFSCME members and sympathizers set up picket lines at UC campuses and medical centers and rallied outside UC headquarters in downtown Oakland. At UC Berkeley, the strike caused minimal disruptions, slowing construction, campus perimeter bus shuttle services and trash pickup.

AFSCME represents nearly 20,000 custodians, food service workers, bus drivers, groundskeepers, parking attendants and patient care technicians at the 10 UC campuses and five medical centers. UC has been in negotiations with AFSCME over two separate contracts since last year.

On July 11, San Francisco Superior Court Judge Patrick Mahoney issued a temporary restraining order at the request of the Public Employment Relations Board, which issued a complaint against AFSCME for bad-faith bargaining, failing to give adequate notice of a planned strike, and for encouraging employees to participate in a strike against UC facilities even though their absence from work would clearly endanger the public's safety, particularly at the medical centers.

Despite the judge’s order, AFSCME leaders moved forward with the job action.