Union Documents
Download the UC-AFT San Diego Local 2034 BYLAWS
Download Our Membership Form
Download the Non-Senate Professional Development Fund Guidelines
Download the Non-Senate Professional Development Fund Application
Biography of UC-AFT San Diego Local 2034
UC-AFT San Diego Local 2034 (our official name) was founded by Wayne Vernon in Physics in the late 1960s but became dormant until the mid 1970s when restarted by Bob Heifetz from Urban and Rural Studies. After becoming an Assistant Professor then, after two years as a half-time Lecturer, I met Bob and joined. At that time the UC/AFT was a Senate and Librarian union and we had a very active local for a number of years even though collective bargaining had not yet come to higher ed in the state. Without a law and contracts, we were in an organizing mode with the other locals and more of a movement for peace, labor rights, etc. As a fairly young group, we were also a social presence including a lot of graduate students. There was support for Third College as the administration constantly moved to undercut its radical community emphasis. This led to some struggles around faculty appointments and tenure.
At the end of Jerry Brown's last term, he signed in to law the Higher Education Employees Relations Act, HEERA. The outcome of this was to mobilize UC/AFT into a Librarian and Non Senate Faculty union. Since librarians were already organized, the resources of the union went toward signing up NSF. At the same time NSF became very active on most of the campuses and in UC/AFT. Election victories for Librarians and then NSF eventually brought contracts (MOUs) to Units 17 and 18. However, a thin dues base made membership growth difficult for these "represented" units and there was no growth in Senate membership as the ability to win and collective bargaining election statewide with the latter was remote. After that initial success, UC/AFT began signing up authorization cards for a Research unit the other one of the four the Public Employees Relations Board had certified as an academic bargaining unit. These academics are largely postdocs working on research funds for our colleagues in the sciences. UC spent around a half million to hire union-busting lawyers to work out a campaign to scare "principle investigators" into scaring their postdocs. Even though we had great success reaching these workers, they did vote down recognition by the UC/AFT.
In the early 1990s, the state budget went in the toilet and there were major cuts in the U.C. budget. The Regents started a program, Very Early Retirement Plan, to encourage very senior (expensive) faculty to retire early. This could work because the retirement system was flush with funds. It did not work out that well system-wide but this Local took a hit with a number of Librarian members taking VERP. Already, Senate faculty had pulled back their union activism and I ended up pretty much running things alone. One bright spot was when the local was able to hire a former student to recruit members and that cut our losses a great deal. However, it was not part of the effort to get involvement out of the new members so 2034 had one activist/president. Much union time was concentrated on a lot of grievances for NSF. But the early MOU for Unit 18 was not very strong so that only occasionally were there victories.
At the end of Gray Davis' last term, he signed a "Fair Share" bill bringing Agency Fees into the coffers of all higher ed. unions. This was a ten-fold increase in income to UC/AFT and allowed for a major increase in local staffing. The the next few years. Local 2034, had full-time staff. Besides beginning to grow again, a few new NSF became officers and the Local became much more visible to members. When it came time for Unit 18 to bargain, there was a whole new level of UC/AFT activism which joined with several other U.C. unions to push for real gains. In fact, a number of unions worked three years without a contract while U.C. drug its heals in negotiations. To cut a long story quite short, the NSF were able to ratify an agreement with almost all of its demands met including the new category of Continuing Employee, a strengthened grievance procedure and binding arbitration for almost all articles of the contract.
Today 2034 has a full complement of officers, Maria Tillmanns as half-time Field Rep and Stephen Potts as Grievance Officer. We meet weekly to carry on local business and work out grievance strategies which are carried out by Maria and Steve. We work closely with the UC/AFT on grievances and other matters and have an excellent record in defending the rights of NSF at UCSD. Now, Librarians are back in bargaining and this round has activated Unit 17 around the state and in the Local.
Fred Lonidier MFA, UCSD 1972 Visual Arts Department