Interview with Dave Wagner transcript - July 30, 2009

What is a furlough?

Furlough in essence is a mandated non-day of work. The way furloughs have been designed is that staff, managers are accountable for a certain number of furlough days in a year. For full-time, 12-month staff and managers, it’s 24. For academic year faculty, it’s 18 furlough days. And a schedule is then worked out on the basic assumption of two days on average a month on furlough days.

The pay for the employee will be evened out, so that the same amount is taken out each month, knowing that by the end of next June, we’ve accomplished the 24 furlough days for full-time staff and managers, and the 18 furlough days for faculty.

Why?

This campus, through furloughs, will realize between 15 and 16 million dollars in salary reductions, and if those salary reductions did not come from furloughs, they would have come from some other type of salary actions that would have had to have been taken.

Such as?

Non-retention, non-reappointment of staff or faculty, and ultimately the likelihood of layoffs.

Top Priority:

We’ve identified three priorities, and in order they are: doing the least to disrupt services to students, whether that’s instruction or direct student services; to minimize to the extent possible the reduction of services to each other on campus, because we are all in this together; and finally, to do what we can to minimize excessive or unreasonable workload shifts. And those are the three factors, combined with the need to achieve a certain level of salary savings, which have guided the implementation of the plan on campus.

Timeframe:

It only seems like it’s been a long time. In fact, the first agreement was only ratified last Tuesday. So we’ve had approximately the equivalent of seven working days to get a plan to the Chancellor’s Office to get the preliminary plan approved, and the preliminary plan was approved. The current delay is because we’ve gone back with the modification to that plan, and the Chancellor's Office has to review that modification. And that’s the reason for the current delay.

Priorities/We’re in this together:

I think the first is for us to remember that as an educational institution, we do need to keep the needs of our students first. That we are a campus community, and I think we need to keep the value we have as a community during these very difficult times. And I think we all need to realize that we’re in it together. Everyone is being asked to contribute as part of the solution as to what truly is a financial tsunami that has engulfed the state and the state budget.

Check csus.edu:

One of the things that we’re encouraging individuals to do, whether they’re on campus or off campus, is to check the information on the campus website, check information on department sites, before they make a decision to come to campus. That way they’re in the best position to determine what services indeed are going to be available on any given day.

Campus not closed:

Those days designated by the President as campus furlough days, it’s important to note that the campus may not necessarily be closed. For example, classes may continue, essential emergency services, public safety are all available. Those employees whose bargaining unit has not agreed to furlough will report to work as regularly scheduled. Conferences that have been planned will continue, and units now are beginning the process of determining their operational needs and the priority of work. And we do anticipate some departments will be open even if to provide limited service on campus furlough days. That’s why it is very important that both members of the campus community and the public use the internet to determine what services are available on any given day.