Bargaining heats up for California state worker unions. Here’s what’s being negotiated

The “hot labor summer” is heating up for workers bargaining with the state of California.

A union representing some of the highest-paid state employees authorized a strike last week. The largest public employee union in California government received an offer from the state that was 80% lower than their initial ask, prompting outrage and cries for labor actions. And yet more workers are growing impatient with the often slow pace of negotiations.

But woven in with union pride and joint disdain for the state’s lackluster wage proposals is a sense of frustration, among some workers, with union leadership itself — especially among members of SEIU Local 1000, which represents close to 96,000 state workers from nine different bargaining units.

California state workers join a host of other unions – including actors and writers, municipal employees, hotel workers, Los Angeles teachers and school employees and health care workers across the state – who’ve made waves this summer by staging strikes and other labor actions after contract negotiations stalled.

Contracts expired in July for 13 of the state’s 21 bargaining units, which represent close to 175,000 state workers. Many unions are asking for raises that are higher than the state says it can afford, given the projected $31.5 billion budget gap. They say they need the money to make up for inflation, including a rise in CalPERS health care premiums next year.

Two unions — representing maintenance workers, and health and social services professionals — have secured tentative agreements that members will need to ratify before the Legislature and Gov. Gavin Newsom give their blessings.

Meanwhile, California’s two largest public employee unions, Local 1000 and the California Correctional Peace Officers Association, have yet to reach deals.

Local 1000 initially proposed an unprecedented 30% raise over three years, which the state met with what union officials described as an “offensive” offer of 6% over that same period. (That number has since increased to 7%.)

The California Association of Professional Scientists, which represents about 4,000 state scientists, have spent the last three years bargaining over a contract that they say should include raises of up to 43% to address long-standing salary disparities. They rejected a “pitiful” February proposal that fell far short of those numbers.

Calls for labor actions grow louder as negotiations drag on

Talk of striking has circulated through various unions.

Local 1000 hosted “Strike School” sessions in April and May to prepare and educate workers about their right to strike, according to promotional emails obtained by The Sacramento Bee. Special guests included leaders from SEIU Local 99 in Los Angeles, which staged a three-day strike of school employees that shut down the city’s school system in late March.

Union leadership has said these sessions were purely educational, although some members have theorized that the union mostly wanted to keep members from going rogue and organizing illegal walk-outs, which could result in disciplinary action.

Last week, the Union of American Physicians and Dentists, which represents doctors and psychiatrists in state prisons and hospitals, authorized a strike last week with support from 91% of voting members.

State unions have periodically authorized strikes during contract talks. But a California civil service union has never walked off the job.

The closest call came in December 2016, when Local 1000 planned a one-day Monday walkout. The union called off the strike the Friday before, with then-president Yvonne Walker saying both parties believed they had “found a path forward” and resumed negotiations.

In what could be construed as “practice sessions” for a real strike, union members around the state have started organizing worksite pickets during their lunch breaks. Local 1000 laid out a goal to host 1,000 worksite pickets by Monday as part of its “Hot Union Summer” campaign.

One such picket last week brought together members of two unions who hope that standing together will get the state to move on both their contract offers.

Unions hope solidarity across bargaining units means better deals for all

Members of SEIU Local 1000 and the California Association of Professional Scientists are teaming up for marches to show the state that workers can’t be turned against one another, members said.

A few dozen Local 1000 members, many in purple shirts, and a handful of CAPS representatives wearing green marched together last Thursday afternoon across the O Street overpass near the Crocker Art Museum. They zip-tied two banners to the railing of the viaduct as throngs of traffic zoomed along below on Interstate 5. Several vehicles let out honks of approval as the marchers waved their signs and cheered.

“The offer of 7% is not enough for our members,” said Anica Walls, Local 1000 vice president for organizing and representation.

Genevieve Parham and her daughters, Christian and Ryan, waved signs and beat on small drums during the rally. Parham, a Local 1000 member, has worked for nine years as an analyst with the Department of Health Care Services helping to administer the Medi-Cal program.

“I like the work that I do — it’s important,” Parham said. “But I don’t feel like they value us.”

Even though Christian and Ryan are home from college on summer break, their mother has so far persuaded them to come to three pickets with her. Parham wants to show her daughters the power of collective action and also get as many people to the picket lines as possible.

“We need to show our numbers to the state,” she said. “We need more people out here.”

Participating in the “summer of labor” is a special feeling for Steve Sander, a senior environmental scientist with CalRecycle and a local union steward with CAPS. The seven-year veteran of state service said he wouldn’t want to be anywhere else than standing alongside fellow workers and advocating for themselves.

“It’s so important, and it’s so wonderful to see people standing up by the millions for what they’re worth,” Sander said, referring to other labor movements around the country that have made waves throughout the summer. “If enough of us stand together, I think we can really evoke meaningful change.”

Local 1000 workers scoff at state offer, urge union to fight harder

Yet not everyone is feeling optimistic about their union.

For some Local 1000 members, the union’s retreat to 18.75% raises over three years — less than two-thirds of the initial goal — felt like waving the white flag before the battle even began.

Cashmere Haywood, a disability insurance program representative based in Chino Hills, said she wished the union would be more aggressive with its negotiations and start seriously considering a work stoppage to show the state they mean business. She pointed to the teachers and school staff with the Los Angeles Unified School District, who won raises between 20% and 30% over a four-year contract after striking for three days in March.

“I’ve lost faith,” Haywood, 28, said. “I‘m really just staying until I see what the contract comes out as. If it is not what meets our needs, then I will definitely leave the union.”

Haywood said her mother, who worked for the state for 15 years and encouraged her to join the union, chose to not renew her own Local 1000 membership out of frustration.

“If I could do anything, I would want to give my union strength and say, ‘Be bold. Don’t be weak,’” said Wayne Stocum, a senior tax auditor with the state Department of Tax and Fee Administration. In July, he wrote a letter to Local 1000’s vice president of bargaining, Irene Green, imploring the bargaining team to push harder on the state and start preparing for the potential of a strike. When Los Angeles municipal employees, represented by SEIU Local 721, went on a one-day strike Tuesday, Stocum said Local 1000 should follow their lead and make a more aggressive statement.

Green, who was in bargaining sessions Tuesday, did not respond to questions via email.

Stocum re-upped his Local 1000 membership recently in the hope that his criticism would carry more value with the leadership. He expressed frustration that his union couldn’t seem to secure a contract with raises that try to keep up with inflation while other unions in the country are securing double-digit raises.

“Every three years, we’re told the same thing. That there’s a reason why we have to take a poor contract,” Stocum said. “Don’t sign a weak contract and tell us to just suck it up again.”