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University of Alaska staff announced a vote to form a union on Wednesday. The union would represent 2,300 permanent staff across the three universities and a dozen community campuses. 

Staff voted to form the union Coalition of Alaska University Staff for Equity, or CAUSE, which would be part of the national United Auto Workers union, in a 1,106 to 610 vote, with 64% voting yes. 

UA staff that would be represented by the union include student services staff, researchers, fiscal and administrative staff, development staff, science communicators, information systems specialists, library workers, athletics coaches and many others, according to a statement announcing the vote. 

“Amid growing uncertainty around state and federal funding for the University, staff cited several reasons for forming a union: consistency and competitiveness in pay and benefits; greater transparency in promotion, career development, and retention; fair workload; and more,” the statement said. 

“This is an exciting day for staff at UA,” said Mike DeLue, a researcher with the International Arctic Research Center at the University of Alaska Fairbanks, in the emailed statement. 

“We did our research, discussed and debated, and overwhelmingly chose to unionize. As soon as the result is certified, we’re ready to sit down with the University and work constructively on addressing the issues that motivated us to form a union in the first place. Improving our working conditions will help us serve more students, enhance UA’s research capacity, and support Alaska communities,” he said. 

The results of the union vote are expected to be certified on April 8, barring any objections or challenges filed by either of the parties, said Jonathon Taylor, director of UA public affairs, by email on Wednesday. 

Taylor also cited financial uncertainty as one of the reasons the university opposed the union effort, which he said was communicated to employees ahead of the vote.

“The university opposed unionization because we believed it would reduce flexibility, slow decision-making, and limit our ability to respond to financial uncertainty,” he said. “That position was operational, not ideological.”

“UA respects the outcome and the right of staff to organize,” he said by email. “We’ll be bargaining in good faith with CAUSE-UAW in accordance with Alaska labor law.”

Taylor noted that existing wages and working conditions will remain in place while the contract is negotiated. He said initial contracts take roughly 400 days to negotiate. He said a 3% salary increase the university requested of the Alaska State Legislature in next year’s budget for all unionized and non-union staff will not apply to the new union members since they are in the process of forming the union and have not yet negotiated a new contract.

“Under Alaska labor law and case law, a contract with a bargaining unit must be in place for negotiated raises to be requested and approved by the legislature,” he said. Taylor said the issue was communicated to staff ahead of the union vote. 

“Non-represented staff remain eligible for that increase,” he said. 

But Charlie Banks, an organizer for the union effort and an academic advisor with the University of Alaska Anchorage, said Thursday that it is the university’s choice, and the new union members should be eligible.

“We believe that the university has the ability to issue the pay increases to us,” she said in a phone interview.

She said support for salary increases is also a show of support for retaining staff, which she says is a common goal of both the union and the university.

“We agree with university admins concerns about difficulties with recruitment and retention. One of the main reasons for this is that Alaska is not keeping up with its peers in maintaining competitive packages for workers,” she said. “Not surprisingly, our peer institutions that have staff unions have much stronger recruitment tools because their contracts are responsive to their needs.”

The new staff union follows the 2024 unionization of UA graduate workers to form the Alaska Graduate Workers Association within the United Auto Workers Local 1907. The union represents graduate teaching assistants, researchers and fellows. They bargained their first three-year contract within 96 days, which secured higher pay, an updated grievance process and a change from at-will to just-cause employment, according to reporting from the student-run newspaper The Northern Light. 

The new staff union joins the national UAW union, which includes approximately 120,000 higher education workers across the country, including staff at the University of Washington and University of California. 

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