Mass Hall to Face Union Backed by National Parent

A week after a labor activist group attempting to organize Harvard clerical workers announced formal affiliation with the largest union in the AFL-CIO, labor leaders and the University administration are getting ready for what may be the final battle in their 15 year war.

Last Friday when the Harvard Union of Clerical and Technical Workers (HUCTW) became a member of the American Federation of State, Country and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), local union leaders gained renewed confidence, as well as strong organizational and financial support, in their effort to win the endorsement of Harvard's 3800 support staff.

Meanwhile in Massachusetts Hall, the chief University administrator in charge of personnel said he is ready to do whatever is necessary, within the law, to keep employees aware of the negative side to unionization.

"They are trying to keep a good face on something that has been going on for 15 years and has been a flop," said Robert Scott, vice president for administration.

Affiliation with the 1.1 million member AFSCME, which has 75,000 university employee members nationwide, has made HUCTW leaders confident that the union will finally garner recognition after four failed attempts to win endorsement from Harvard workers.

HUCTW, which is attempting to organize Harvard employees including secretaries, research assistants and health-care workers, will not gain formal recognition as a bargaining unit until it is approved by a majority of these staff members, according to federal law.

The affiliation with AFSCME marks the end to a more than a year long period when the local labor leaders rejected affiliation with their previous parent union, the United Auto Workers (UAW). As recently as 1982 Harvard support staff in the Medical Area voted down unionization, but union officials are confident that by affiliating with AFSCME they will get the boost to successfully and their 15 year effort to organize University clerical workers.

Union proponents said that AFSCME will better reflect HUCTW concerns than other national unions have done in the past. AFSCME has been a leader in women's issues, such as pay equity, and that appeals to HUCTW, which is trying to organize a labor pool that is 83 percent female as part of a "national struggle for the working woman," said Kristine Rondeau, a HUCTW organizer.

Harvard will be the national union's "premier organizing drive" for 1987, even though some of its past major efforts have involved the organization of almost ten times the number of workers, said Jack Howard, assistant to the AFSCME president.

"The campaign is significant because Harvard is the institution it is," said Howard. "A win will be significant because it will demonstrate that even in a very privileged institution workers want their rights.

The international union has already poured $500,000 into the Harvard effort, which an AFSCME spokesman described as a "shoestring operation for the last couple of years." The funds will enable the home-grown union to hire more staff, increase one-on-one contact with workers, distribute leaflets, and do mailings, said Phillip Sparks,a spokesman for AFSCME in Washington.

"They will have much more increased visibilityin the next couple of weeks," said Sparks.

The international parent union, currently themost successful organizing union in the country,will also bring organizational experience from itsefforts at other colleges nationwide, said Howard.In 2 years AFSCME organized 20,000 employees atthe University of California and it also hasformed branches at Rutgers and the University ofMichigan.

The national union will back HUCTW "as long asit takes" the union to gain support. To convince amajority of the 3800 workers to vote for the unioncould take between six months to a year, accordingto estimates made by the national office.

Rondeau said that the election would take placein a couple of years, after the union has built upthe organizing committee membership form 380 to600.

But if Harvard has its way, employees will votedown the union, by a margin of two to one,according to Scott's estimates. The University istraining supervisors "to explain the non-unionside to staff" but will not "force opinions," onthem, said Scott. "If the supervisor does not wantto explain the non-union side to staff, then we'llfind some other way to explain it."

Harvard opposes unionization of Universitysupport staff because it could constrainuniversity job structures and impose an exorbitantpayscale, Scott said. Harvard hired more non-unionworkers when the custodians unionized because theybecame "unbelievably expensive," Scott said.

"[Unionization] could change the way we dobusiness," Scott said