Bargaining Update 5/24/22

The EMU-AAUP Negotiating Team had informed the university that we would be willing to meet with their team today, via Zoom, to begin good faith negotiations to a successor collective bargaining agreement and had provided the administration with a link to join the meeting. This morning, our bargaining team appeared on the Zoom meeting, but representatives of EMU did not. 

Our team is disappointed in the administration’s outright refusal to begin bargaining by insisting on in-person negotiations from the outset, and we have filed an unfair labor practice charge with the Michigan Employment Relations Commission in an effort to require the administration to participate in remote bargaining sessions. To date, the administration has provided no justification for its position other than unsupported contentions about miscommunications and technology. 

Our team disagrees with this assertion. In-person negotiations would not have less opportunities for missed cues or misunderstandings. The current rate of transmission in Washtenaw County is higher than any other period in the pandemic except the January Omicron surge. Thus, under the current CDC guidelines for in-person meetings during periods of high community transmission of COVID-19, negotiating teams would be required to wear masks. Such a mandate would inhibit communication far more than appearing via Zoom. Furthermore, several of our team members are in high-risk categories or care for loved ones who are themselves high risk. And several team members are located in other states and agreed to join our team on the reasonable assumption that Zoom bargaining would continue. 

The refusal to bargain via Zoom seems to us particularly in bad faith, as the Parties have negotiated twice since the beginning of the pandemic without issue. First, the parties engaged in numerous discussions regarding the effects of COVID-19 prior to the Fall term of 2020, and second, the parties negotiated an extension to the current CBA via Zoom just last summer (at a period of lower COVID-19 transmission than the present). Furthermore, all contract administration matters, including a review board hearing as recent as last week, have been performed via Zoom since the beginning of the pandemic, as have department and other meetings, which continue to be performed via Zoom at the various departments at EMU.

We would hope that the administration reconsiders its decision to not participate, even in initial sessions, in bargaining. At the absolute least, we would hope that the administration could appear via Zoom for the purpose of setting ground rules, introducing team members, trading initial proposals, and tentatively agreeing to non-controversial or unchanged language, to move negotiations forward in a collaborative manner while the issue is decided by MERC. 

EMU-AAUP Negotiating Team

Tricia McTague

Matt Kirkpatrick

LaMar Stewart

Marguerite DeBello

Deron Overpeck

Noel Brock