Posted October, 2007

PSC Victory for CUNY Research Foundation Workers after 4-year battle to Win Union 
 

Workers at the City University of New York (CUNY) Research Foundation at the University’s Graduate Center finally won their battle to become a unionized workplace when ballots in a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) election were counted Thursday, October 4th. The Research Foundation (RF) workers voted overwhelmingly, by a count of 73 to 16, to join the Professional Staff Congress.

The victory came after a long battle with RF management, which used every opportunity to delay the day that the workers’ voices would be heard and their ballots counted, going back to 2003, when RF workers at the Graduate Center organized and filed for an NLRB election. RF management’s formal objections delayed the vote by two years. When an election was finally held in May 2005, the RF again objected and the ballots were impounded pending an investigation of the merits of the management objections. The objections centered on the RF claim that graduate students who worked at the RF in a variety of positions, including research and clerical jobs, were not “employees” and not covered by federal labor law. These claims were rejected at every level of the NLRB, culminating in a unanimous June 29, 2007 ruling by the national labor board ordering the ballot count to go forward.  

DELAY IN COUNTING

Following the June ruling, the ballots were scheduled to be counted on July 18. Yet, when PSC representatives arrived, they found that the count would be delayed again pending the resolution of challenges to certain ballots. When the ballots were finally counted on Thursday, October 4, professional employees voted for inclusion with the larger bargaining unit, and the overall vote was 73 to 16 for representation by the PSC.  

Union leaders were delighted with the outcome, though clearly frustrated by the long delay, and vowed to move to bargaining a new contract for the Graduate Center RF employees as soon as possible.  

“It is outrageous that the CUNY Research Foundation did everything under the sun to prevent their employees’ voices from being heard,” said PSC President Dr. Barbara Bowen. “That just shows you why they need a union. For four years, the RF made sure the ballots were not even counted—and the employees did not have the protection of a union. Now the message is irrefutable: RF employees at the Grad Center overwhelmingly voted union. The PSC will be proud to represent them.”  

USING THE NLRB ELECTION
PROCESS TO THWART UNIONIZATION

The RF workers’ case was a  textbook example of how the NLRB election process that governs private-sector labor relations has become a tool for management efforts to thwart unionization. It is a graphic illustration of why labor law reform is urgently needed, and why the PSC and others in the labor movement support the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) in Congress, which would provide a quicker route to determining whether workers want a union in their workplace. (EFCA passed the House this year and failed a cloture vote in the Senate; it will be reintroduced in 2008.)  

The Research Foundation employs workers on 23 CUNY campuses and its mission is to help CUNY faculty and staff locate and win research grants. Though CUNY Chancellor Matthew Goldstein is also the chair of the RF board, the RF has been ruled by the NLRB to be a separate, private entity. That is why RF workers seeking to unionize had to use the federal NLRB process that governs private-sector labor relations rather than the Public Employee Relations Board (PERB) process under the State’s Taylor Law, which governs New York State public-sector (including CUNY) labor relations. The PSC represents workers at three RF locations, the central office, where it has a contract, and at New York City College of Technology and LaGuardia Community College. Both units are in negotiations for a first contract.

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