Thousands of University of California employees are expected to go on strike today despite a court injunction prohibiting the planned strike.

San Francisco County Superior Court Judge Patrick J. Mahoney issued the injunction Friday, saying the employees' union did not give the university enough prior notice of the scheduled strike.

Approximately 8,500 members of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299, which represents approximately 20,000 custodial, security and patient-care employees, are expected to protest against the university today instead of going to work.

Negotiations have been ongoing since August 2007, and the union, representing approximately 1,243 UC Berkeley employees, initially threatened to strike last month.

Lakesha Harrison, president of the union, said the strikers would be primarily service unit employees, as patient-care unit employees have made some headway in their negotiations with the university.

Harrison said the union has not ruled out a patient-care workers strike and said some patient-care employees will strike in honor of the service strike line.

The planned strike, announced last Thursday, is set to last five days.

Following the union's strike announcement, university officials announced early Thursday that the Public Employment Relations Board, the state agency that deals with the bargaining efforts, agreed with the university's request for a court-ordered injunction against the strike on account of "bad faith bargaining" by the union during negotiations.

Harrison said the workers' absence during the strike will prove to the university that they should not be neglected.

"It will show them that they need us and need to do right by us," she said.

UC spokesperson Nicole Savickas said although employees who strike will not necessarily be fired, they will face consequences from the court.

"We expect employees to show up as scheduled and we expect the union to abide by the court order," she said.

Tags: AFSCME LOCAL 3299