Negotiations for the contracts of approximately 20,000 employees at the University of California are at a standstill as both sides have not met at the bargaining table since last month.

Contract negotiations for employees represented by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299 began in August 2007 for the patient-care technical employee contract and in October 2007 for the service employee contract, but no agreements for either contract have been reached.

Negotiations for both contracts reached an impasse, indicating that the union and the university have reached a point where simple negotiating is over.

Proponents on both sides of the bargaining table have blamed the other side for what they have called an unwillingness to compromise.

Union officials said the university has denied their demands to bring the wages and benefits of their members up to market value.

"We are not joking when we say we need $15 an hour for minimum wage," said Kathryn Lybarger, UC Berkeley bargaining representative for AFSCME.

Meanwhile, university officials also contend the union has not offered any counter proposals, keeping negotiations from proceeding. The university and the Public Employment Relations Board, which oversees the bargaining efforts, successfully sought an injunction to prohibit a strike by the union that began on Monday, citing "bad-faith bargaining" by the union.

"The union has refused to come to the bargaining table," said UC spokesperson Nicole Savickas. "The fact of the matter is that a lot of the proposals AFSCME has made have been unchanged from the beginning."

The union has made more progress in bargaining efforts for the patient-care technical contracts than in the contracts for service employees.

Savickas said the state budget plays a large role in determining the amount of money available for service employee wages. Compensation for patient-care technical employees relies on revenue from the university's five medical centers.

"We're trying to make progress," Savickas said. "But we've got other employee groups we need to pay."

A fact-finder report on the negotiations, which included a neutral party, stated that contract terms should not be dependent on a particular funding source, including the state budget.

Tags: AFSCME LOCAL 3299