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After eight months of negotiating the loss of wages for faculty that were affected by the removal of winter intercession in 2012, the Board of Trustees, Pasadena City College Faculty Association (PCCFA) and administration finally reached a settlement at last week’s board meeting which will cost the district a total of $1.4 million.

The settlement comes as a result of the July 30 ruling from the Public Employment Relations Board, which found the district had violated the law four years ago by eliminating winter intersession from the academic calendar and not negotiating with the PCCFA before taking action.

According to Senior Vice President and Assistant Superintendent for Business and College Services Dr. Robert Miller, “214 individuals were named in the settlement and a $100,000 was set aside for additional payments as needed.”

Each affected employee to receive $4,672 from the district including worker’s compensation and Medicare with state and federal taxes deducted from the payments.

In addition to getting compensated for all losses suffered during the last three years, the settlement included a 21 percent interest rate, which was the total of a seven percent interest rate per year and amounting to a total of $1,051 for each employee that was affected. The interest rate will be compensated in a separate check with no tax deducted.

Since winter was eliminated in 2012 there was no 2013 winter class schedule to work from in determining who among the faculty should be compensated.

According to an email from the PCCFA to the faculty and administration, “the two parties agreed to look back to winter 2011 and 2012 to determine who might have been likely to teach in a robust post Proposition 30 Winter intersession, with the agreement to include the most faculties possible in the remedy.”

They also agreed that it would be, “speculative to attempt to determine what classes any individual instructor would have taught. Therefore, the parties agreed to treat all individuals equally for the purposes of the settlement.”

As directed in the email, if some faculty members find themselves not included on the list they will have 60 days “from the execution of the settlement by the Board of Trustees,” to present substantial evidence they should have been incorporated into the list of faculty who may have taught. Including “those who lost travel deposits or were forced to drastically alter their curriculum as a result of the cancellation of winter should come forward in the sixty day appeal period with convincing proof.”

When the board voted to eliminate winter, they argued that there was no winter intersession before 2004 and that a trimester system would increase the district’s revenue by $600,000. However, aside from the elimination of winter altogether, part of what the district found was the board had violated the law by not negotiating with the PCCFA before taking action.

“This award is a sea change in the faculty relationship with the district,” said the PCCFA in the email. “The faculties are full participants in the governance of this great college.”

Kristen Luna
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