Group continues petition efforts
By: Brian Austin, Staff Writer
Issue date: 10/30/07 Section: University
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On Friday afternoon, supporters of collective bargaining gathered at UNC-system President Erskine Bowles' office to deliver a petition of about 500 signatures.
The petition was the latest effort to influence leaders to publish an article, favoring collective bargaining, for the University Gazette.
Earlier this year, the groups had appealed to the UNC-Chapel Hill administrative level for support, but because Chancellor James Moeser refused to push the article's publication, the advocates went above him.
"It's really the appropriate step administratively," said Domenic Powell, a member of Student Action with Workers. "It's not meant in any pejorative way. Part of what informed that decision was the importance to the whole of North Carolina."
Jeff Davies, chief of staff for UNC-system President Erskine Bowles, accepted the petition Friday but said he needed time to think it over. He could not be reached for comment by press time Monday night.
The Gazette has maintained that the decision preserved the style of the publication and wasn't censorship. The article was deemed opinion by Gazette editor Patty Courtwright who said last month that the Gazette would not publish the article.
The article in contention has since run in The Daily Tar Heel.
The group that gave the petition includes students from SAW, Students for a Democratic Society and Students United for a Responsible Global Environment. Community members, the UNC Young Democrats and N.C. workers' organizers also are involved.
"We brought petitions … to the power source of the University who has been very dismissive of workers' rights," said Tamara Tal, a representative of SDS. "The students … are speaking loudly, and the University needs to listen."
Friday's events weren't the first recent encounter between administrators and employees.
In November 2006 several faculty, staff and community members organized a protest and presented a petition about 15 dental technicians whose jobs were outsourced.
UNC administrators received the petition but did not reverse their outsourcing decision.
"There's no countervailing force to anything the chancellor or president of the university chooses to do," said David Brannigan, vice chairman of the Employee Forum.
On Friday the petitioning groups made a list of demands, which included that Bowles reverse the Gazette's decision to withhold the article from the forum's newsletter insert - the same demand the group had made to Moeser. Demands also advocated the repeal of N.C. General Assembly statute 95-98, which prohibits collective bargaining.
"Where I work, everybody is afraid," said Barbara Gear, a longtime Chapel Hill Transit employee who spoke Friday. "They're afraid to get fired if they talk about unions."
Gear said the groups' aim is to reach whatever level of the administration necessary to improve the lives of Chapel Hill employees.
"It's not to go against the system or the job," she said. "Everybody could benefit."
Contact the University Editor at udesk@unc.edu.
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