FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE FROM: Mark Crane mark@LOUISVILLE.EDU
TO: WORKPLACE
RECEIVED: 5/03/02
POSTED: 5/03/02
SUBJECT: UMASS ARRESTS 35 AT UNION DIRECT ACTION
REPLY TO : "Adjunct Mailing List" <adj-l@lyris.gc.cuny.edu>
WE NEED YOUR HELP URGENTLY NOW!
PLEASE E-MAIL AND PHONE> ADMINISTRATORS!We need your support and solidarity. UMass Amherst chose to arrest 35 union
supporters yesterday, and today suspended the 6 undergrads who took part.
This results in them losing their jobs, their housing, their course credits for the semester, and several won't graduate. The sit-in and rally that prompted the arrest was around a simple issue: on March 5, undergrad resident assistants
voted 138-88 to join the UAW Local 2322. The University has refused to bargain,
dismissing the MLRC decision and breaking the law.WE NEED YOUR HELP URGENTLY NOW!!!!!! PLEASE E-MAIL AND PHONE
ADMINISTRATORS!!!!Dear All,
Here is the latest news: the undergraduates who were arrested yesterday have been suspended from the University and barred from
the University campus. That means they lose all academic credit for
this semester, their housing, their health care, and if they are RA's,
their jobs.
This is an outrageously harsh punishment for non-violent civil
disobedience in protest of the University's own illegal actions.
This is a much, much harsher punishment than that dealt out for drug,
alcohol, or other offenses. Graduate students have not yet heard from the
University--their registration is handled by an office in the graduate school, not in the Registrar's office. There is no reason, however, to believe that
they will not receive the same punishment. (Among others, those
graduate students include our own Alex Betancourt-Serrano, who will
presumably no longer be allowed to teach our Junior One seminar.
Students are entitled to a hearing after their suspension, and
the first hearing will take place at 10:30 tomorrow morning. It would
be very helpful if you could PHONE AND E-MAIL YOUR PROTESTS to the
administration, before and after 10:30 tomorrow.I think e-mails and calls should go to Acting Chancellor Marcellette
Williams, 545-2211, mwilliams@chancellor.umass.edu, Javier
Cevallos, 545-2333 and cevallos@spanport.umass.edu, and Dean of Students
Jo-Anne Vanin, 545-2300 and vanin@stuaf.umass.eduPLEASE FORWARD THIS MESSAGE WIDELY!
If you have any other ideas for interventions, please let us
all know. In solidarity, Sara
UMass sit-in ends with 34 arrests
Resident assistants press labor dispute with administration
By Andrew C. Helman, Globe Correspondent, 4/30/2002
A group of 34 students and union activists were arrested at the
University of Massachusetts at Amherst yesterday after they staged a sit-in to
protest the school's refusal to bargain with the fledgling resident assistants
union, said Barbara Pitoniak, university spokeswoman.
At 12:30 p.m., 15 protesters swarmed into the office of the vice
chancellor for student affairs and another 75 pickets gathered outside the
administration building, university officials and students said.The protesters were trying to force the university to bargain with
the 360-member resident assistants union, which became the first of its kind
in the nation when it formed in March.The university maintains that RAs are an integral part of the
education process and should not be unionized.Yesterday as protesters chanted ''union power, union power,'' and
vowed to occupy the vice chancellor's office until the university submitted
to their demands, police moved in.Fourteen of the 15 went limp, forcing police to remove them on
stretchers, according to university officials.As police brought
the protesters onto a bus, another group sat inthe road,
locking arms and blocking the way.Police made 19 more arrests. Those arrested are expected to be
charged with trespassing and resisting arrest, said UMass police
spokesman Jim Lyons.''We are sitting in here for our own beliefs, I guess, until either
the university bargains with us or sets a date to bargain with us or
until the police come in and take us out,'' said Angela
Zammarelli, 20, a junior resident assistant reached by cellphone
during the sit-in yesterday.''It's sad that in a time that they are cutting different
departments on campus > they are spending money fighting the union.''Union members filed 13 unfair labor practice charges against the
university last month, one of which sought to force the
university to bargainwith the group. While the Massachusetts
Labor Relations Commission reviews the charges, university
officials have said they will not bargain with the union
regardless of the commission's ruling.
''As you know the university has taken a position on this and has
refused to bargain,'' Pitoniak said.
This story ran on page B2 of the Boston Globe on 4/30/2002. More RA stuff: http://www.uaw2322.org/raunion
Photos from the RA rally 4-8-02 http://wmass.indymedia.org/media/photos/UMassRAs4-8-02/
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