Last week, members of Georgetown Living Wage Coalition unsuccessfully attempted to force their way into a closed meeting of the University’s Advisory Committee on Business Practices. While these tactics raise awareness of the continuing problems with the implementation of the Just Employment Policy, they ultimately hurt the LWC, diminishing the credibility and bargaining power they have spent the past few years carefully cultivating.
In April 2005, the University accepted the Just Employment Policy proposed by the LWC. The policy guaranteed campus workers “fair and competitive compensation packages.” The University agreed to increase wages and real benefits to a total compensation of $13.00 per hour, up from $11.33. The Just Employment Policy factors in seven components, ranging from health care to transportation and other essentials of existence. A real hourly wage of $9.92 is combined with these other, harder-to-monetize benefits, to form the total compensation package.
Six months after the implementation of these policies, members of LWC believe that the package subcontracted workers receive still does not meet the requirements stipulated by the Just Employment Policy. University officials disagree. The situation appears to have reached an impasse and real dialogue is necessary to resolve this issue.
The University should strive for transparency, explicitly and publicly outlining how workers are being compensated. According to Economics Professor and ACBP member Robert Cumby, contractors this fall presented ACBP with tables that indicated that their workers compensation packages reached the agreed upon $13 an hour. However, this information was not released to the public.
“The contractors were sensitive about just what should be made public and in what form and the tables were therefore not public information,” Cumby wrote in an e-mail. According to Cumby, the ACBP is now examining the question of “how best to provide information on compliance.” The timely release of information regarding workers’ benefits will facilitate the discussion the University and LWC need to have.
According to Maya Zwerdling (SFS ‘08), an LWC member who also sits on the ACBP, the LWC “is focusing energy on educating the campus about how the living wage is not yet implemented.” She said the group also continues to work with the ACBP.
The University also remains committed to the ACBP, according to University spokesman Erik Smulson. “[We] believe it is the most appropriate forum to evaluate and deepen understanding of the ethical and moral issues that should be taken into consideration in the evaluation of staff labor policy,” he said. If the university’s commitment to ACBP is genuine, the goals of LWC would be better served working within this framework than without it.
While storming a closed meeting raises awareness of the issue among the student body, it does not encourage university administrators to engage the LWC in dialogue. The LWC should not fritter away the credibility it has crafted during its long struggle with the administration. The LWC’s hunger strike last March drew national attention, but these new rash actions blemish that victory.
