Wayne State reject offer

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DETROIT-United Auto Workers Local 2071, representing 908 clerical workers at Wayne State University, is continuing a strike that began Aug. 25. In a move that surprised everybody, members of Local 2071 turned down a proposed settlement on Sept.

Meanwhile, about 608 professors, members of the American Association of University Professors, who struck with Local 2071, reached a tentative agreement and returned to their classrooms on Sept.

The strike was provoked largely through the actions of administration president David Adamany, who is notorious for his anti-union positions and his confrontational style ("Unions aren't necessary in an academic setting").

Long before negotiations, the administration cooked up a strategy to force the staff to accept the anti-union Hay system of reclassifying jobs, short-term (read "two-tier") appointments, and more administration-conducted merit evaluations.

According to Adamany's philosophy, workers' and professors' salaries were to be tied to state appropriations. They used a 1percent to 2-percent salary offer as a battering ram. But these things were thrown off the table by the strength of the strike.

"Just like the '60s"

Local 2071 was forced to respond when, during negotiations, the administration hired 52 "replacements" (read "scabs") to begin working in the event of a strike. Not only that, but the administration demanded that clerical workers who normally handle registration train the scabs.

Infuriated by this outrage, the workers walked off the job, and Local 2071 then called a strike. On Adamany's direct instructions, five union picketers and a representative of the international union were roughed up and arrested by campus police.

Immediately, the strike mushroomed. The professors walked out, and the local labor movement responded. There were several mass rallies and a huge publicity campaign against the arrests. Later, Adamany was forced to drop the charges of "trespassing," because Wayne State University is a public institution.

Student groups organized sympathy rallies and the professors organized teach-ins. Many remarked that the campus was "just like the '60s." As support for the strike grew and as the tactics became more militant, a tentative agreement was given.

Terms of the agreement The offer contained, most importantly, a 4.2-percent across-the-board pay raise in the first year (based only on a median salary of $16,000) and 3.2 percent in the second year. It also gave workers 2.5-percent in equity pay (a gesture towards step increases long frozen).

Gone were the Hay classification study, the short-term appointments, salaries tied to state appropriations, and the 1-percent to 2percent salary offer.

Professors got a similar offer: 4.5 percent across the board in the first year and 3 Special offer. Good Send only until 12/15/88 (with one year for $6. 6 months for $3. (with Enclosed is a contributi Name Address City Stat Zip Tel. VERT.

TURNO LOCALIT THE NEW A SEAR ON THIS 13 STRIKE OUR I0YL4T#Y TIME DETROIT-On Sept. 2, in a special election, Jerry Tucker was elected director of Region 5 (eight states in the South Central United States) of the United Auto Workers union (UAW).

Tucker is head of the "New Directions" movement, and his defeat of incumbent Kenneth Worley marks the first time in 40 years that someone not a member of what nowadays calls itself the "administration caucus" will sit on the UAW's International Executive Board (IEB). Worley was the most senior member of the IEB.

In 1948, the late Walter Reuther consolidated his control of the UAW, banishing all serious opposition and setting years, the IEB has been the Reuther caucus, and the Reuther caucus has been the IEB.

So when a controversial question arose,

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vote for 'New

out on a course of red-baiting and "labor- management cooperation." For these last 40