The Long Island Jobs with Justice Workers’ Rights Board, in collaboration with and the student group the Social Justice Alliance and the Research Assistants Union at Stony Brook University, organized a Hearing yesterday to investigate the negotiating strategies of the Stony Brook Research Foundation, the employer of 740 Research Assistants at Stony Brook University who are members of CWA Local 1104. Initially, the Workers’ Rights Board extended an invitation to the Research Foundation to present their case, but the RF declined, stating that they would rather not negotiate in public.
A day before the Hearing was scheduled to take place, Stony Brook Administration informed the student group that their Room Request, which was approved a month earlier, was revoked. Outraged, one of the students, along with members of the union, met with Associate Dean Dr. Susan DiMonda to demand that they have access to the space. Armed with fallacious excuses and weak rationale, Dr. DiMonda claimed that it was clear that this was a “labor event” and it had to be approved through Human Resources, not student activities.
“As a social justice student group, this Hearing is obviously a concern to us, and we have proof that we are co-sponsoring event. Not only do we have minutes of the meeting, but we have the room request approval form,” Nazma Niles, Social Justice Alliance secretary, explained to Dr. DiMonda.
Despite an hour-long meeting with DiMonda, the students who invited the Workers’ Rights Board to campus to hear the complaints of the Research Assistants, could not get back the space.
The Workers’ Rights Board, in collaboration with the students and the union, decided to take matters into their own hands and hold the Hearing anyway, this time in a public space.
“This just makes them look worse in the long run,” said Zosia Turek, one of the Research Assistants who spoke out against the Research Foundation in the Hearing.
After hearing testimony from the workers, it’s no wonder that Stony Brook did not want the event to take place: the students presented evidence to prove that the Research Foundation, in collaboration with Stony Brook Administration, has been utilizing anti-union intimidation and avoidance tactics for years.
The testimony concluded with the Workers’ Rights Board, which included Honorable Jon Cooper, Suffolk County Legislator of District 18; Victor Fusco, ESq, of Fusco, Brandenstein and Rada Law Firm; Father Bill Brisotti of Our Lady of Miraculous Medal Church; and Michael Crowell, Economist with the New York State Department of Labor; making a list of recommendations to the Research Foundation (below)
“I sent my daughter to school here,” said Victor Fusco at the conclusion of the Hearing, “If I knew how Stony Brook treated its student workers here, I would have sent her somewhere else.”
Workers’ Rights Board Recommendations for the Research Foundation:
1) Research Foundation should be transparent as a receiver of public funds. It should be accountable to the public.
2) University must be a venue for free expression in exchange of ideas, and cease efforts to intimidate advocates of the union.
3) University must allow equal (free) access to university facilities, including meeting rooms.
4) University must cease intimidating of RAs.
5) Research Foundation should provide an accounting of monies spent on law firms hired in relation to Union organizing and contract negotiations.
6) Research Foundation should expeditiously enter into a contract that includes:
- Minimum salary of $20,000
- Reasonable Annual Raises
- Improved medical and dental insurances
- Waiver of student activity and technology fees
7) A reasonable salary increase is miniscule in contrast to $350,000,000 annual budget.
8) The Research Foundation should negotiate in good faith. It has not done so as of yet.
The Workers’ Rights Board of Long Island was established by Long Island Jobs with Justice to enhance the rights of all workers by providing a moral voice on issues of economic justice and offering a community-based forum in which workplace grievances can be heard by the broader public. Comprised of leaders from labor, business, academic, medical, religious, political, and legal fields, as well as youth and other prominent members of the community, the Workers’ Rights Board of Long Island is a direct response to the ineffectiveness of government agencies in ensuring the rights of workers in a timely and rigorous manner. The Workers’ Rights Board brings the judgment of respected community leaders to bear in highlighting violations of workers’ rights as violations of all of our human rights.
