Workers say the numbers point to understaffing, as they often must work overtime and through breaks to care for patients and complete other essential tasks.

UCSF nurse Erin Carrera, a representative for the California Nurses Association, said that most instances of overtime occur when there are not enough staff members, nurses have not finished their patient-care work or a replacement has not arrived to relieve them.

“We’re nurses,” Carrera said. “We’re not going to walk away from our patients because we don’t have a release.”

Out of nearly 15,000 nurses employed by the UC system in 2012, nearly 13,000 earned some amount of overtime, according to a UC payroll report published July 31. The payroll report also shows that 235 of the 270 ultrasound technologists and 485 of the 547 radiology technologists employed by the system earn overtime. These ratios have remained somewhat consistent since 2010 and 2011.

UC spokesperson Dianne Klein said that overtime is a necessary part of providing adequate health care services and that staff members are well-compensated for overtime work.

Nurses working overtime are typically compensated at a rate of 1.5 times their regular salary, according to the nurses’ contract. The contract also stipulates that overtime cannot be mandatory except during university-declared emergencies.

“Effective medical care means that staff must be flexible and willing to work overtime in the event of emergencies,” Klein said in an email. “I believe you’ll find that the majority of our medical center employees – dedicated professionals – enjoy their jobs and consider UC a great place to work.”

Overtime work is voluntary for many workers, but UC San Diego MRI technologist Richard Smith said that the UC system can say it is voluntary because they know someone will do the work. Smith said that he and his co-workers each work seven to 25 hours of overtime every week in order to fulfill patient-care needs.

“Someone has to step up and say ‘I’ll do the overtime’ and take care of the patients,” Smith said.

American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Local 3299, which represents more than 12,000 patient-care workers, has claimed that many UC medical centers are experiencing understaffing and has cited staffing levels as a major reason for recent strikes. The union has been in contract negotiations with the UC system since 2012.

“There is far more use of overtime,” said AFSCME spokesperson Todd Stenhouse. “UC’s policy has been to demand that health care workers do more with less.”

Tim Thrush, vice president of patient care at AFSCME and diagnostic sonographer at UCSF, said that patient-care workers have to work overtime in order to care for every patient that management books.

According to Klein, however, the number of health care staff members employed by the UC system increased from 2008 to 2013, with the number of patient-care technical workers increasing by about 13 percent and the number of health care professional staff members increasing by about 35 percent. Service staff represented by AFSCME increased by less than 1 percent.

“Our medical centers operate in a highly regulated environment and if we had unsafe staffing levels, we simply would not be allowed to operate,” Klein said in an email.

Stenhouse said the UC system should convert its per diem workers, who receive no guaranteed benefits, to its career staff. He added that there is a need for enforceable levels of safe staffing and a committee to ensure safe staffing ratios are maintained.

Contact Sohan Shah at sshah@dailycal.org.

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The total UC payroll of roughly $10.6 billion in 2011 grew to $11.2 billion in 2012. The highest source of funding for pay came from medical enterprises, such as teaching hospitals — which became the single highest source of funding at $2.8 billion — and the Medical Compensation Plan.

“The biggest jump was from medical enterprises,” said UC spokesperson Dianne Klein. “They were generating more money.”

Funding from the federal government and from general funds and educational fees dropped from 2011 by nearly $28 million and nearly $40 million, respectively. Funding from private gifts, grants and contracts increased by more than $24 million to $636 million during the same period.

According to a UC press release, the 10 highest-paid UC employees in 2012 were “health sciences faculty members (typically world-renowned specialists in their fields who are paid predominantly from their clinical practices) and athletic coaches (paid from non-state funds).”

Lecturers, other teaching faculty and clinical professors represented the highest percentage of academic personnel payroll, while those in the health care and allied sciences group were the highest percentage of staff payroll. There were no general merit increases for employees not represented by unions in 2012.

“UC salaries are below market,” Klein said. “That does make it hard to attract top talent.”

Klein cited several alternatives to compensation as incentives for working for the UC system, such as the university’s public service mission.

The report attributed the increase in payroll to “a combination of factors, including increased research activity and market pressures for more competitive compensation, particularly in the areas of health care, instruction and research.”

UC Academic Senate Chair Robert Powell stated that the decrease in public funding has made some people feel that the UC system is becoming less and less like a public university.

“We want UC to be for California,” Powell said. “Many of us regret that we have to take more out-of-state students and cut faculty and services. If state funding is there, we won’t have to do these things.”

The highest-paid UC employee in 2012 was former UCLA basketball coach Ben Howland, who earned roughly $2.2 million in gross pay.

Contact Sohan Shah at sshah@dailycal.org.

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The implementation follows more than 12 months of negotiations, including a two-day strike in May, between the university and AFSCME Local 3299, the union representing the workers. The contract was implemented on July 24 and will last until negotiations are complete. Either the union or the university can bring new proposals forward, after which negotiations will resume. If both parties agree, the new terms will replace all or part of this contract, depending on which issues were successfully negotiated.

“Having completed all stages of the bargaining process, including state-assisted mediation and fact finding, the university is legally entitled to implement its last proposal,” said UC Vice President for Systemwide Human Resources and Programs Dwaine Duckett in a statement. “We would have preferred to reach a settlement, but this implementation provides our patient care staff with fair wage increases and good benefits now, rather than forcing them to continue waiting through stalled negotiations.”

Changes for AFSCME workers include a guaranteed step increase of 2 percent for eligible employees on or about July 1 and a guaranteed wage increase of 1.5 percent on or about Oct. 1, as well as medical, dental and vision benefits and contribution rates for employees and their families.

The contract also includes an implementation of the university’s post-employment benefits program, which includes an increase in the UC system’s contribution from 10 percent to 12 percent and an increase in employee contribution from 5 percent to 6.5 percent for workers hired before July 1, as well as a slightly modified tier of pension benefits for workers hired on or after July 1.

“The contract imposed on the Patient Care Technical Unit by UC includes a substantially smaller across the board wage increase than UC granted to its management staff on July 1,” said AFSCME Local 3299 President Kathryn Lybarger in a statement. “UC also is forcing frontline patient care workers to make substantially increased pension contributions, up to a 20% increase in Health Insurance premiums, parking increases up to 10%, and reductions in paid leave.”

Lybarger also stated that the contract does not address alleged unsafe staffing levels at UC hospitals.

“We’ve been negotiating with AFSCME in good faith since June of 2012,” said UC spokesperson Dianne Klein. “We’ve offered proposals specifically on pension reform, and AFSCME gave nothing back.”

AFSCME Local 3299 spokesperson Todd Stenhouse stated that the union has offered compromise but that the offers were pushed aside. He also added that executive pensions continued to increase at the expense of students, workers and taxpayers.

The union held a rally and march in Los Angeles Friday morning where more than 200 supporters protested the university’s announcement. Twenty-five protesters were subsequently arrested for blocking traffic and refusing to disperse.

“We are going to redouble our efforts to hold UC accountable,” Stenhouse said. “Our members are united in standing for a better UC.”

Klein said that there was no planned timetable for negotiations going forward.

Contact Sohan Shah at sshah@dailycal.org.

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At the meeting, both sides discussed an AFSCME offer to increase employee pension payments in exchange for a focus on more staffing at UC medical centers. AFSCME has said that more staff members are needed to improve safety in the medical centers following negative ratings and a higher incidence of patient injury.

The university rejected the offer because the cost was higher than it was willing to accept, and the offer was not presented as a formal proposal, according to UC officials. The university, which criticized AFSCME’s strikes in May, has focused on pension reform in the negotiations.

“Pension reform has been the primary sticking point in these
negotiations,” said UC spokesperson Dianne Klein in an email. “UC is engaged in reasonable pension reform to protect the long-term viability of retirement plans so it can continue to provide quality pension benefits to all employees.”

Pension reform has been at the center of negotiations since they started in June 2012, as unions fought to keep their members’ pensions after the university did not pay into the fund for more than 20 years, leading to a shortage of available money for retirees and forcing employees to pay increased dues into the pension fund.

Representatives from AFSCME also say a central issue of Thursday’s offer is protecting patient safety.

“This proposed compromise was about protecting patients,” said AFSCME 3299 President Kathryn Lybarger in a press release Friday. “In rejecting our good faith offer, UC Administrators have not only shown contempt for the workers at the backbone of the UC medical system, but also a shocking disregard for the safety of the patients they serve.”

But AFSCME’s May strike put patients and their families unnecessarily at risk, said UC spokesperson Shelly Meron.

Disagreements over executive compensation have also arisen. AFSCME alleges that the university has diverged from providing affordable care and that policies cutting expenses burdened UC employees.

“UC is demanding that its lowest paid workers agree to pay more and work longer in order to subsidize the six figure annual pensions that UC routinely shells out to its highest paid executives,” Lybarger said in the release.

AFSCME advocates a cap on executive pensions similar to caps instated by Gov. Jerry Brown earlier this year.

But the university said that executive compensation is necessary for UC medical centers to offer top-tier services.

“We have to compete in a very competitive marketplace,” Meron said. “We have to offer compensation that will attract the best candidates to these jobs.”

Contact Simon Greenhill and Sohan Shah at newsdesk@dailycal.org.

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Gabrianna Dumaguin/File

The University of California system saw an increase of about 1,263 in undergraduate students accepting admission offers in this year’s freshman class, with proportions of out-of-state and international students planning to enroll also increasing.

The total number of admitted freshman students stating intent to register in the UC system was 44,016 this year. Of those students, the percentage who are California residents dropped by 2.8 percent from last year’s freshman class, while SIRs from international and out-of-state students increased from 15.5 percent of all students planning to enroll to 18.3 percent for fall 2013.

“The admissions department plans for these things, and our hope was to increase our enrollment this year,” said Dianne Klein, a spokesperson for the UC Office of the President, about the total increase of SIRs. Klein said that enrollment data will change by fall and that SIR data is only a “snapshot” of the final numbers. “For now, the SIR statistics are preliminary, so our results aren’t concrete enough to determine what effect the (statistics) will have on the UC system,” she said.

The universitywide SIR statistics include guaranteed offers from UC Merced, which were offered to freshmen who met admissions requirements but were not originally admitted to the campus of their choice.

The percentage of out-of-state and international admitted freshmen planning to enroll at UC Santa Cruz more than doubled compared to last year — the biggest change in this statistic across the UC campuses. UC Santa Cruz also had the largest percent decrease in California resident SIRs over last year, with 6.6 percent fewer California resident students submitting SIRs.

The trend of a decreasing percentage of in-state SIRs follows the long debate about the increasing number of international and out-of-state students within the UC system. However, a summary released by the university, along with the data, supports this increase in nonresident enrollment, citing that “nonresidents pay higher tuition, thus self-funding the cost of their education, and helping support increases in course offerings and faculty hiring, which benefit all students.”

UC Berkeley SIRs totaled 5,979 students this year, an increase of 614 students from the campus’s 2012 numbers. The raw number of admitted freshmen planning to enroll at UC Berkeley in all residential categories increased, including California residents, with 115 more state residents planning to enroll than last year.

However, despite this increase in raw numbers, the percentage of admitted freshmen planning to enroll at UC Berkeley who are California residents decreased by 5.9 percent from last year. The percentage of out-of-state admitted freshmen planning to enroll at UC Berkeley increased by 1.6 percent, and international students planning to enroll went up by 4.3 percent from the year before.

Contact Dennis Vidal at dvidal@dailycal.org.

Correction(s):
A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that percentage of California residents who are planning enroll as freshmen at the UC this fall dropped by 2.8 percent from last year’s freshman class. In fact, the percentage dropped by 2.8 percentage points.

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Tuition would stay the same at all professional schools except the system’s four nursing programs and four newly created master’s degrees. Discussion on professional school fees for the coming year was postponed in November by Gov. Jerry Brown in the wake of the passage of Proposition 30.

Graduate students in academic programs, however, will not be affected by the fee proposal. Professional programs require supplemental tuition fees that other graduate students in academic programs do not pay. Professional programs include law, medicine and business degrees, and academic programs include studies in English, chemistry and history, among others.

According to UC spokesperson Dianne Klein, supplemental fees make sense because professional schools follow a very different funding model than undergraduate programs do — in large part due to the policy decisions of past state governments.

“Gov. Schwarzenegger, for example, believed that while the state had an obligation to fund undergraduate education, the professional schools should be the responsibility of the individual students,” Klein said in an email. “These were the future high earners—the physicians, lawyers and business people.”

The regents will still be asked to approve a fee increase for university’s nursing programs due to a lack of promised state and federal funding after a ramp-up of the nursing programs. The regents will consider approving new fees for new degree programs. Overall, 800 students will be affected by new charges.

“It isn’t very transparent when (the regents) do any fee increases over the summer when students aren’t on campus,” said Bahar Navab, president of the UC Berkeley Graduate Assembly.

UC Berkeley School of Social Welfare Dean Jeffrey L. Edleson said he is sympathetic to the rising costs of higher education and students’ struggles to pay bills.

“On the other hand, by freezing tuition and PDST increases we are actually cutting the University’s budget each year,” Edleson said in an email. “We simply cannot provide the world’s best public education on a shrinking budget year after year.”

Even if the proposal on professional degree tuition is enacted, it could be changed in as little as a year.

 We concluded that most of the programs can get by for one year on their existing fee levels,” Klein said. “This is not a long-term, sustainable proposition, but it is one we think we can do for a year.”

Contact Nico Correia and Sohan Shah at newsdesk@dailycal.org.

Correction(s):
A previous version of this article incorrectly stated that funds from Proposition 30 and a undergraduate tuition buyout by the state government would be used to freeze tuition for many of UC’s professional degree programs. In fact, these funding sources are not connected to the tuition of the programs.

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In striking specific provisions in the 2013 Budget Act, Brown still allocated the $10 million to the university, in addition to $10 million to the CSU system, but without restricting how the money should be spent. This line-item veto was one of the few changes the governor made to the budget.

The earmark that Brown originally proposed in January for online courses aimed to focus the university’s spending on prioritizing more affordable, accessible online course development.

But the provisions were met with strong opposition from higher-education officials who were concerned with the lack of flexibility the earmarks would impose. UC Office of the President spokesperson Dianne Klein said Brown’s decision to veto the provisions is beneficial to the university.

“It’s a win-win,” Klein said. “We still get the money, and we will still put it toward online education, but (Brown) got rid of the restrictive language.”

However, there is some concern that without the $10 million earmarked, decision-makers will not follow through in spending the money on improving the university’s online education system. Dean Florez, a former California state senator and president of the higher-education advocacy foundation 20 Million Minds, said the provisions served as important guidelines for ensuring the funds for online education were spent accordingly.

“Without that language, they are saying, ‘Hey, we hope you do your best,’ versus holding the UC accountable,” Florez said. “Either they will spend more money than the $10 million on really revamping online education, or they will essentially put it on the back burner.”

However, Brown says he redlined certain provisions to avoid imposing cost pressures on the university, according to the summary of the budget released Thursday.

“Eliminating these earmarks will give the University greater flexibility to manage its resources to meet its obligations, operate its instructional programs more effectively, and avoid tuition and fee increases,” Brown said.

According to H.D. Palmer, deputy director for external affairs at the California Department of Finance, the veto of the earmark provisions does not detract from the commitment made to online education.

“Even with the veto, we still fully anticipate that UC will make additional strides towards online education,” Palmer said. “The governor concluded it would be best to get rid of the earmarks in order to allow the UC more flexibility.”

Contact Stephanie Petrillo at spetrillo@dailycal.org.

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Michael Tao/File

California lawmakers voted Wednesday to approve an audit of revenue and staffing levels at two UC medical centers, raising concerns about the UC system’s readiness for the implementation of the Affordable Care Act.

The audit, passed by the state’s Joint Legislative Audit Committee in a 9-0 vote that included five abstentions, will focus on revenue and staffing levels at the UCLA and UCSF medical centers. In a separate hearing on Wednesday, the state Senate Committee on Health made an inquiry into the state’s readiness for the Affordable Care Act, which will go into effect in 2014.

Assemblymember Adam Gray, chair of the Joint Legislative Audit Committee, requested the audit in a May 13 letter to the committee. Citing an increase in revenue at the UC medical centers that did not translate to increased patient caseload, Gray used the lack of donation to charity from UCLA Medical Center as an example.

“If UCLA Medical Center does not generate sufficient revenue to meet the county average for charity care, we need to understand why,” Gray said in the letter. “If, on the other hand, UCLA is generating substantial revenue in excess of its costs, we need to understand where those revenues go.”

The audit will also identify the number of employees at the UCLA and UCSF centers who earn more than $200,000 a year.

American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees 3229, a union representing about 13,000 UC patient care technical workers, published a whistleblower report in March that claimed inadequate staffing levels led to patient harm and recently struck citing reasons of understaffing.

“I’m very pleased with the Legislature’s raising concerns and taking things seriously,” said Kathryn Lybarger, president of AFSCME 3299. “These are taxpayer-funded institutions — public hospitals — so they should be accountable to the public.”

UC spokesperson Dianne Klein criticized the need for the audit, citing audits from Price Waterhouse Coopers and the California Department of Public Health as evidence that the UC medical system has already been audited enough.

Klein also said the information sought by the audit is publicly available.

“The irony is that the results of this additional audit will disprove AFSCME’s allegations against UC,” Klein said. “Certainly, we will cooperate as we always do with audits, but we believe this is an attempt by unions to involve the legislature in contract negotiations.”

State auditor Elaine Howle estimates that the audit will take more than 2,500 hours of audit work at a cost of about $270,000.

But with the Affordable Care Act due to go into effect next year, Lybarger said the information the audit brings will outweigh its costs.

“It’s absolutely worth taking a look to see if the centers are prepared for the tsunami of new patients that we will see next year,” Lybarger said.

Contact Chris Yoder at cyoder@dailycal.org. Follow him on Twitter @christiancyoder.

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Jacob Brown/Staff

Thousands of health care workers employed by the University of California participated in a strike Tuesday and Wednesday over pension reforms at UC medical centers and student health centers across the state.

AFSCME 3299, a union representing more than 12,500 UC patient-care employees, began the two-day strike Tuesday morning amid ongoing contract negotiations with the university that began in June 2012. University Professional and Technical Employees 9119, a union representing 3,300 technical workers, also went on strike in solidarity with AFSCME 3299.

Workers have expressed discontent with understaffing, proposals by the university to reform pension benefits and the university’s use of private contractors the unions say are inadequate for providing appropriate patient care.

“I’m tired of being told by my manager, ‘Do the best you can, prioritize, triage,’” said Judy McKeever, a registered respiratory care practitioner at UCSF Medical Center. “Our patients deserve better. Our patients deserve to get all their therapies. They deserve to be seen by us as frequently as they should be.”

Despite a 97 percent vote in favor of striking by union members in May, an average of more than 75 percent of union employees worked their scheduled shifts Tuesday, according to UC spokesperson Dianne Klein.

The number of workers striking also varied at the different UC medical centers, according to Juliana Bunim, senior public information representative for UCSF Public Affairs and University Relations.

At UC Davis, about 380 of union employees out of a total 3,400 took part in the strike Tuesday, said David Ong, a representative from the public affairs office at UC Davis Health System.

On Tuesday at noon, about 300 workers were striking outside UCSF Medical Center.

Earlier that morning, members of AFSCME and UPTE also held a demonstration outside the Tang Center. About 50 people attended to support the 30 Tang patient-care workers.

The university, however, opposed the strike, saying it will be costly and could negatively impact patient health. In a press conference Monday, John Stobo, the UC system’s senior vice president for health sciences and services, said that the strike will cost about $20 million and result in the cancellation of several medical procedures.

At UCSF alone, five surgeries for children with complex heart conditions, 12 pediatric chemotherapy infusions and two appointments for women who need operations by fetal treatment center surgeons were postponed because of the strike, according to a UC press release.

Although a Sacramento Superior Court judge issued an injunction Monday prohibiting some workers from striking, it only applied to about 450 workers who have critical duties, according to Klein.

“We believe it’s completely inappropriate to put patients in the middle of a labor dispute and jeopardize essential services to them as a negotiating tactic,” said Dwaine Duckett, vice president for systemwide human resources at UC Office of the President. “Leaders of both unions claim their chief concern is patient care, but it’s very simple: If they strike, services to patients suffer.”

Contract negotiations between AFSCME 3299 and the university have been ongoing since June 2012. In September 2012, the union contract expired, and both the union and university have been at an impasse in negotiations since December 2012, according to Klein.

Tanya Smith, local 1 president of UPTE 9119, was laid off after working for the university for 22 years. She says the strike was a necessary action because the university is wrongfully prioritizing executives over frontline workers.

“(Mark) Yudof gets $230,000 a year (in pension) for five years of service,” Smith said. “I’m here because that is not OK. If we want a public institution that serves the public, we have to … demand it.”

The university says it is necessary to enact substantive pension reforms to help address a $24 billion unfunded pension plan liability and enable the university to continue offering employees financially sustainable pension benefits.

In March, AFSCME 3299 published a whistleblower report claiming that inadequate and uneven staffing levels had led to patient neglect and harm.

“We put the report out as a call for help,” said Kathryn Lybarger, president of AFSCME 3299, in March. “When you press the call button, you’re not going to see someone show up. That’s bad patient care, and we want to see a change.”

The university believes the workers are being offered a generous contract. In a document published last week, it states that all of the workers are being offered a 2 percent minimum raise.

Click here to see strike footage and for interviews with patient-care strikers.

Andrea Guzman is a news editor. Contact her at aguzman@dailycal.org.

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Mary Zheng/File

Thousands of health care workers employed by the University of California have begun a two-day strike at UC medical centers and student health centers across the state.

The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees 3299, a union representing more than 12,500 UC patient care employees, began to strike Tuesday morning amid ongoing contract negotiations with the university that began in June 2012. University Professional and Technical Employees 9119, a union representing technical workers, is also striking in solidarity with AFSCME 3299.

Workers have expressed discontent with understaffing, the use of private contractors whom they say are inadequate and proposals by the university to reform pension benefits.

“I’m tired of being told by my manager, ‘Do the best you can, prioritize, triage,’” said Judy McKeever, a registered respiratory care practitioner at UCSF Medical Center. “Our patients deserve better. Our patients deserve to get all their therapies. They deserve to be seen by us as frequently as they should be.”

On Tuesday at noon, about 300 workers were striking outside UCSF Medical Center. However, strikers had organized shifts, and according to John Salsbury, a spokesperson for AFSCME, hundreds more workers were expected to picket outside the medical center between 6 a.m. and 11 p.m.

Earlier that morning, members of AFSCME and UPTE also held a demonstration outside UC Berkeley’s Tang Center. About 50 people attended to support the 30 patient care workers who work at Tang.

The University of California, however, opposed the strike, saying it will be costly and could negatively impact patient health. In a press conference Monday, John Stobo, the UC system’s senior vice president for health sciences and services, said that the strike will cost about $20 million and result in the cancellation of several medical procedures.

Although a Sacramento Superior Court judge issued an injunction Monday prohibiting some workers from striking, it only applied to about 450 workers who have critical responsibilities, according to UC spokesperson Dianne Klein.

“We believe it’s completely inappropriate to put patients in the middle of a labor dispute and jeopardize essential services to them as a negotiating tactic,” said Dwaine Duckett, vice president for systemwide human resources at UC Office of the President. “Leaders of both unions claim their chief concern is patient care, but it’s very simple: If they strike, services to patients suffer.”

Andrea Guzman is a news editor.Contact her at aguzman@dailycal.org and on Twitter @guzmanandrea5.

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