“No es justo.” Strikers Victoria and Alicia tell me as I pull out my notebook at the picket line at Bancroft and College. They are two striking CAL housekeepers, who, between them have cleaned the University of California at Berkeley for over twenty years. They joined picket line chants from the sideline on the morning of the first day of a five-day strike.

“UC, escucha, escucha, estamos en la lucha.” They were among the hundreds of Asian, African-American and Latino AFSCME 3299 workers who walked off the job through out the State of California UC System in violation of an injunction against their strike that was issued by court order last Friday.

After working all night Victoria and Alicia joined their co-workers at the picket line when their graveyard shift ended to protest the University’s latest insult to injury.

“No, no es justo,” that the new CAL Chancellor will bring in a salary in the high six-figures and whose car allowance and perks alone probably amount to more than the $700.00 every two weeks that Victoria and Alicia clear in take home pay after deductions. Deductions that include rising health care costs, and parking fee increases. The health care and parking fee hikes alone probably cancel out the 2% a year that Victoria and Alicia got in their last contact.

They give us a pittance with one hand and take it away with another.

It’s hard to tell if it’s hubris or arrogance or both that allows the storied elite liberal academic institution it to pay substandard wages to women like Victoria and Alicia while continuing to practice questionable, some say, corrupt pay practices when compensating its own top University Administrators. Notwithstanding the pay scandal that forced out the last UC chancellor, it looks like business as usual. Witness the recent re-hiring of the “retired” police chief with pay and perks that exceeded her pre-re-retirement package. That was bad enough to call for efforts to curb retirement hiring irregularities.

I had to agree with Victoria and Alicia. “Me parece que no es justo.” I told them.

Especially when you look at the numbers. The University has offered 2% a year for a multi-year agreement. That’s less than the 3.2% that Bureau of Labor has published in its last quarterly Cost of Living index.

In most contract negotiations where protracted talks lead to a strike, the issue is usually about money or to use bargaining table parlance, the employer’s “ability to pay.” The University has taken the position that its budget is tied up with the State Budget Crisis and that it can’t respond to the Union’s demands until there is an end to the structural wreck that is the California State Budget.

But according to a report issued by the Fact Finder in this dispute, a neutral, commissioned by the parties to make a non-binding recommendation, the UC can pay. The Fact Finder conducted a hearing where both sides presented competing economic arguments and found that the University is far from broke and has plenty of money to meet the Union’s demands. So its not that the UC can’t pay, it just doesn’t want to put more than its latest offer of 2% on the table. And as long as it can hold out on Alicia and Victoria, it doesn’t have to.

What makes it “mas injusto” is that the cleaning square footage that Victoria and Alicia have had to cover during their shift has dramatically increased as the University has failed to hire replacements. When positions become vacant due to retirement or injury the University’s understaffing compounded by a doubled up work area has resulted in work related injuries that have caused Alicia to undergo more than one knee operation. After a full shift, her knee was so bad that Alicia to chant from her seat on a concrete planter next to Victoria. She simply could not stand long enough to march in her own picket line.

“Dicen que este es uno do los mas prestigiosos Universidades en el mundo, pero nos tienen en pobreza.” It’s said that this is one of the most prestigious University in the world, but they have us in poverty. “Como puede ser?” How can that be?

Victoria and Alicia will strike for the entire week, risking their pay to fight for a better contract. It really begs comprehension that an institution with the wealth and power of the UC system would seek to enrich itself at the expense of women like Victoria and Alicia. Every time I see the ubiquitous CAL logo, I’ll think about Victoria and Alicia and what the UC’s prestige and privilege has cost them.

I also know that they are not alone.

As I approached the picket site on my way home from my early morning workout at a nearby gym, I encountered UPTE (University Professional and Technical Employees) members of CWA, (Communications Workers of America.) They had covered all of the North Shattuck street side entrances to the University with picket signs. They are also in contract talks with the UC. One of the UPTE strike supporters, a researcher in microbiology had taken a paid day off to show solidarity with the striking AFSCME service workers. Down the street, two construction crews had shut down operations on their construction site at a new capital improvement project that the University found money for. Corporate sponsorship manages to get what it needs from the UC.

What will it take for the UC Board of Regents to care as much about Victoria and Alicia as they do about their new buildings and their own privilege and power?

Ask them.

Richard Blum, Chairman, Blum Capitol Partners
William De La Pena, MD
Russell Gould, President, Wachovia Bank
Judith Hopkins on; Chief Operating Officer, Americus Capitol Corporation
Eddie Island
Odessa Johnson
Joanne Oberg, Partner in California Strategies
Sherry Lansing, CEO of Paramount Pictures
Monica Lozano, Publisher and CEO of La Opinion
George Marcus, Essex Property Trust;
Norman Patti, Westwood One
Bonnie Reis, Pegasus Capitol Advisors
Frederick Ruiz, Ruiz Foods
D’Argartanan Souza
Paul Varner, Partner in Varner & Brandt
Paul Wachter, Main Street Advisors