University Administration Responses
Once the strike began, the administration several times affirmed the right of the custodial workers to unionize. But it maintained that the university should and would remain neutral regarding the voting process on unionization. Several communications from the UM administration, however, seemed to side with UNICCO in displaying a preference for elections over card checks:
- One example is Shalala's letter of April 12, 2006, which stated: "These outside protesters and the SEIU want union recognition without a single ballot cast by any UNICCO workers who would be affected." UM faculty responded that with a card check system, any worker not signing a card is counted as a vote against the union, and they argued that the card check was the most representative system for the workers who would be affected by the outcome. SEIU reported that an estimated 57% of workers had signed membership cards, suggesting that support for unionization existed.
- A second example was four full-page ads (costing $55,000 each, for a total of $220,000) placed by UM in The Miami Herald during the last week of April, 2006 that claimed that SEIU "doesn't want to vote" and that the union is "against freedom and democracy." UM faculty responded that the advertisements contradicted the UM administration's claim of neutrality on how a union vote should be cast.
Read more about this topic: University Of Miami 2006 Custodial Workers' Strike
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