On March 11, the University of California began formal impasse (“fact-finding”) proceedings with representatives from the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees union (AFSCME) in an effort to reach an agreement on a new contract for UC service workers.

UC has been in contract negotiations with AFSCME since last July, and believes that state-assisted impasse proceedings may help resolve outstanding issues, which include differences about raises and health insurance costs for UC service workers.

“The university is working very hard on a fair contract for our service employees, and we hope that moving to this next phase of the collective bargaining process will help us get an agreement,” said Howard Pripas, Executive Director of Labor Relations for UC.

A detailed overview about the university’s and the union’s proposals regarding the key outstanding issues accompanies this release, and can also be found online at http://atyourservice.ucop.edu/employees/policies/labor_relations/index.html.

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