Marc S. Posner
North County News
Orange County Register
13 Aug 1992: b09.
Waging the latest battle of the state’s budget war, 125 members of a California State University, Fullerton, union Wednesday protested the planned layoffs of 13 employees.
Chanting slogans such as “It’s a shame to have a state where cutbacks make us second rate,” the pickets marched in front of the university’s administration building from noon to 1 p.m.
They wore V-shaped pink ribbons as a symbol of victory over pink slips.
California State Employees Association officials say the university can save $400,000 a year and eliminate the need for layoffs by converting the campus to a four-day, 10-hour-a-day schedule.
Some schools have gone to four-day weeks during summer sessions, said Jack Samit, a CSU system assistant vice chancellor. But he said such a schedule during the spring and fall would not work. “It’s still a 40-hour work week,” he said. “We would still have to have the campus open five days a week. The school is there to serve the students, not to facilitate things for the employees.”
But Judith Serlin, a union representative, said the layoffs of library assistants and computer-lab technicians would rob students of needed support services.
Copyright Orange County Register Aug 13, 1992