Craig lends support on picket line
By Bruce Karnick
The Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 284 Food Service Workers Strike hit two full weeks and neither side is backing down from their initial stances. Superintendent Dr. Robert Mc-Dowell and the district are standing behind their statements that their last offer is their “last, best, and final.” McDowell has also released statements addressing many questions from the community as well as presented real world numbers from the districts “last, best and final offer” that was given to the union on Monday, Feb. 6th.
Recapping the salary portion of the final offer, in terms of individual impact, the district’s final offer provides substantial pay increases going as high as 31.2 percent spread over two years.
•28 percent of the employees in the bargaining unit will receive a pay increase of 20 percent or higher spread over two years.
•50 percent of the employees in the bargaining unit will receive a pay increase of 15 percent or higher spread over two years.
•75 percent of the employees in the bargaining unit will receive a pay increase of 10 percent or higher spread over two years.
•Employees hired before Jan. 1, 2023 and making $18.32 per hour or less will see a minimum pay increase of 12.6 percent spread over two years, ranging from 12.6 percent to as high as 31.2 percent depending on the employee’s date of hire and current placement on the salary schedule.
The district is also raising the starting wage from $13.85 per hour to $15.04 per hour for year one and to $15.34 per hour for year two. There are provisions in the offer related to healthcare, assistance with non-slip footwear and retention bonuses.
With the main disagreement around salary, the district released a chart explaining the expired contract wage scale along with the equivalent wage scale under the current proposal. The chart has five employee classifications; Class 3 works three hours per day, Class 4 and Class 5 work 5.75 hours per day, Class 8 works seven hours per day and Class 9 works seven or eight hours per day depending on the position held. Class 9 at eight hours a day is the high school lead supervisor, which is one person and Class 9 at seven hours is the assistant supervisor and also one person.
The chart breaks pay down by the expired contract, year one of the new offer, year two of the new offer, the two-year total of the new offer and the two-year total of the new offer plus the $1,200 retention payment.
See the large chart at the top of the page.
Without factoring in the $1,200 retention bonus, the largest percent increase for both years is 12.9 percent, and the lowest is 3.7 percent. If you count in the retention bonus, the largest increase is 28.3 percent and the lowest is 7.3 percent. The 7.3 percent is the top wage earners in Class 8.
The district also included comparison numbers for schools around the state with comparable enrollment. The schools listed are Inver Grove Heights, Richfield, Mahtomedi, South St. Paul, West St. Paul and Cambridge. The data supplied is sorted by top salaries and is for the first year of the proposed contract.
For lead cooks at both the elementary level and the secondary level, Hastings had the top pay for the expired contract period as well as the proposed contract. For cooks, Hastings falls into the middle of the pack in both the expired contract and the offered contract. For cook assistants, Hastings was in the middle of the expired contract and falls to the second from the bottom for the offered contract.
See chart at right.
An important piece to note when looking at the comparison of pay rates for the first year of the offered contract, it does not include the first half of the $1,200 retention payment.
Hal Goetz, the SEIU Local 284 negotiator pointed out some issues with the max pay comparisons.
“In terms of the comparable wages that the district uses, I know from all of them, it takes way less time to get to top pay than it does here in Hastings. Most other food service workers that are union represented can top out three or four years and they are at top base pay. In Hastings right now, it is 11 years.”
Goetz explained further as to what happens when a worker changes positions and pay classes. “When you move from a line cook to a head cook, you have to start all the way over at the bottom. Which isn't the case in a lot of contracts. So, it takes longer to get there. When you move up in pay grades, you start all the way at the beginning and then it takes you all the way 11 years to get to the top again. The lifetime earnings of these people are definitely lower than the lifetime earnings of people in other districts even if Hastings has that kind of headline higher rates at the top.”
Goetz spoke on the $1,200 retention payment and the reasons behind the union not wanting a payout. The first concern he expressed was budgeting. He claims it is easier to budget based solely off an hourly wage than when a lump sum is to be paid. Plus, the lump sum may not benefit a new hire whereas a better starting pay will. Another issue with the lump sum payment is that raise percentages only affect the hourly wage and do not affect the lump sum.
Here is an example to help better explain. The base pay of year one for Class 3 was $15.04 under the proposed offer. According to the district numbers, the majority of the workers work 174 days a year. The Class 3 employee works three hours a day, multiplied by 174 days works out to 522 hours. If that first year $600 lump sum payment were paid as an hourly wage, that $15.04 would become $16.19 and the same exact money would be paid out for the first year.
The change would come in the second year and beyond. The second-year proposed wage increase is 4.3 percent. At $15.04 per hour, and additional 4.3 percent is an increase of 65 cents per hour. If the year one pay rate was the $16.19 per hour, the raise would be 70 cents per hour, but that still does not factor in the second-year lump sum of $600. That would raise the second-year lowest wage to $18.04 per hour, which is still only five cents more per hour than they are proposing with the $15.69 per hour plus $1,200 lump sum.
Paying the lump sum as an hourly wage changes the base pay. By the end of year two, the $15.69 increases to $18.04 per hour and only adds $26.10 total to the wages that worker gets over the course of two years.
The union is expecting the next contract negotiation in two years will only base raises off of the base pay, not the base pay plus lump sum, another reason they do not want a lump sum payment.
“We want permanent raises because that's the way we know they're going to make it into our contract forever. Someone can try to play games with one time money down the road about whether we actually got it and how that affects raises in the future,” added Goetz.
Superintendent McDowell also addressed some points made by the union: “The union has repeatedly made comments that the district’s proposal offers only a $0.35 pay increase. This is simply false. The attached summary document shows how the pay of individual Food Service employees would be impacted over two years under the district’s final proposal.
The district is including retention payments in its calculation of the percentage increase an individual employee will see in terms of compensation. The Union is ignoring this payment when it claims the district is only offering a two percent pay increase.
The district has proposed to eliminate three steps on the current salary schedule in order to raise starting pay and increase pay for newer employees. Again, the union is not acknowledging this aspect of the district’s proposal in its public comments, nor has it cooperated with the district’s efforts to allocate financial resources to areas where both parties agree there is a need to increase hourly rates due to overall market conditions.
The union has stated there are employees making as little as $12 an hour. This is another false statement. As you can see in the attached summary document, the actual hourly rates of the Food Service group range from $13.85 per hour to $27.28 per hour. Many employees still have room to grow in terms of hourly compensation because they have not reached the top of the salary schedule based on years of service.
The union’s statements to the public and media have not acknowledged that many of the employees in the bargaining unit have not reached top pay on the salary schedule and are eligible for step increases that will increase their hourly compensation. As noted in the attached summary document, individuals who are currently making $13.85 an hour will see their hourly pay increased by a total of $1.84 an hour under the district’s proposal. This means that, by July 1, 2023, all current Food Service employees would be making at least $15.69 per hour under the district’s last, best and final offer.
The union has not offered any comparison data to justify its wage proposal. The district’s last, best and final offer is based on what other district employee groups have accepted during recent negotiations and data the district has collected in terms of what neighboring school districts pay similar positions.”
The district office has also received questions about striking employee’s health insurance. The Journal received a memo dated 1-26-23 that was reportedly given to all food service workers, and it outlined a variety of questions that employees could have prior to the strike. The memo described access to the building and/or district resources, that picketing is not allowed on school property and it explained how it would affect their pay and benefits.
Striking employees will not receive pay from the district while they are on strike, including for any holidays, school closures, etc., and they will not be approved to use any form of paid leave while on strike.
The timing and duration of a strike will impact how benefits will be affected for striking employees. The district will issue COBRA notices to employees who participate in a strike because participation in a strike is effectively a reduction in hours that will impact eligibility for benefits.
The district has begun issuing the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA) notices to employees which lead to the assumption that the school district had begun firing the striking employees, forcing an additional press release from the superintendent.
“Striking workers are not entitled to continue receiving pay and benefits from the district while they are on strike. The district did send COBRA information last week to provide notification that employees would lose coverage, beginning March 1, 2023, through the district while they are on strike. The union was aware the district would be sending out COBRA notices. The purpose of the COBRA notices was to notify striking employees who are receiving health insurance coverage through the district that not working due to a strike means they are not eligible to continue receiving district health insurance benefits and to advise them of their right to continue coverage at their own expense as provided by law. (The Q& A memo mentioned above explained the COBRA process as described previously.) This document was shared with the Food Service group on Jan. 26, 2023, so it should not have been a surprise to any of them that the district sent out COBRA notices last week. I am aware that the union is suggesting today that the district has “fired” striking workers. That claim is simply false. As to the union’s claims today that the district is attempting to “intimidate” striking workers, the district’s response is that it is not intimidation to notify striking workers that going on strike will affect their benefits and to provide them with information about how to continue coverage at their own expense,” explained Superintendent McDowell in his email statement.
Goetz also spoke on the district’s current financial situation. “The Minnesota School Boards Association (MSBA) recommends that districts keep their fund balance somewhere between eight and 12 percent of their yearly budget. Most school districts live somewhere in that eight to 12 percent. Whatever you expect to spend this year, you want to have eight to 12 percent of that in the bank. The yearly budget for the Hastings School District is just under $61 million. The district has $25 million in the bank with a little over $10 million in what they call their assigned fund balance. That means they have just under $15 million, $14.8 million I believe is unassigned, just sitting there right now. That is a little over 24 percent of their yearly budget just sitting there. That is twice what the MSBA recommends at their upper range. A lot of districts have the goal of five percent for their unassigned funds. This district says it wants two month’s expenses in the bank at any given time, that is about 17 percent. That works out to be just over $10 million of unassigned funds. By their own policy, they are they are over $4.5 million extra in the bank over and above the balance they want to maintain.”
When pressed for dollar amounts the union is looking for regarding wages, Goetz simply said they are working on it and he could not divulge any specifics at the time of the interview. He did explain that in terms of total dollars, the two sides are apart by about $170,000 over the two years. Spread out over 35 employees, that is an average salary increase of $2,428.57 per year. It is hard to break that down in terms of hourly wages because there have been no numbers released about how many employees work in each of the tiers.
The district did release another statement on Feb. 17 that pointed to the school’s board book website that contains all the documentation the district has presented to the union. View that by visiting https://meetings.boardbook.org/Public/Agenda/ 931?meeting=568821.
Outside of statements and interviews, the union has not presented any documents with a counteroffer including direct financial figures for the public or media to review.
During the picketing on the afternoon of Feb. 17, US Representative Angie Craig paid a visit to show support of the Food Service Workers and speak to the media. Representative Craig’s visit brought the Twin Cities TV stations down to talk to her and they did a great job monopolizing her time asking questions related to the attack on her in her Washington D.C. apartment complex. The major news stations did not care to talk about the strike and Rep. Craig’s handler ushered her away due to time constraints before questions could be asked about the strike. Here is what Representative Craig said at the start of the visit regarding the strike.
“I just wanted to come out here this afternoon and make sure that I lend my voice to SEIU and Local 284 because we know that the people standing here on this picket line are the people who feed our kids every single day here in this school district. And so, I’m going to be encouraging the district to get back to the table to work to make sure that there’s some consensus that you could get to a conclusion to this situation because everyone in our country and especially those who are serving our students, our kids deserve to make a living wage in this country. I think that these folks who were standing here today, and the community support for them, I just wanted to come and lend my voice to make sure that you know that I’m going to stand with the working men and women of the State of Minnesota. So again, thank you for having me out. And it’s just an honor to be here and to be your voice in Washington. Thank you.”
As of press time, there have been no additional scheduled meetings between the two sides, which gives little hope to the strike ending soon.
