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The Faculty Associations are associations of UC Senate faculty on the campuses of the University of California. Each FA is dues supported and therefore completely independent. All of them, except UCLA, have joined together as the Council of UC Faculty Associations (CUCFA) UCLA FA left the Council in about 1995. CUCFA is affiliated with the AAUP; faculty dues reflect membership in both organizations.

The History of the UC Faculty Associations

If the UC Faculty Associations could point to one person as the founder, it would be Professor David Feller, who came to UC Berkeley Boalt Law School in 1967 after a distinguished career in labor law in which he argued several cases before the Supreme Court, negotiated collective bargaining contracts for the US Steelworkers and other unions, and was active in civil rights litigation. He served on the University of California Retirement System Board (UCRS) for more than 15 years, during which time he helped expand coverage and benefits, including elimination of contributions by those reaching the 80% cap on benefits, adjusting the percentage factors of UCRS to the PERS levels, and improving many different types and categories of survivor benefits. In 1987, he was awarded the prestigious Berkeley Citation in recognition of his extraordinary achievement in the field of labor law and his outstanding service to UC Berkeley.

UC Campus Faculty Associations Emerge in the Early 1970s

In the early 1970s, Feller encouraged the formation of associations of senate faculty on UC campuses with the expectation that UC faculty would vote for union status as did the faculty in the state university system. If faculty were to unionize, they would need to appoint a collective bargaining agent. The campus Faculty Associations would be an alternative to the AFT as collective bargaining agents.

The Vote

The representation elections were held in March 1981. Faculty voted whether they wanted representation, and if so, which organization did they want to represent them: the AFT or the Faculty Association.

By a slim majority, most campuses voted against formal representation. There were runoff elections at two campuses: UCLA and UCSC. In the end, the faculty at UCLA preferred the Faculty Association over the AFT for representation, but they still preferred no representation by a margin of 51.4% to 48.6%.

Although the Santa Cruz faculty did vote for certification of the Santa Cruz FA on that campus as its collective bargaining unit, which it still retains today, the vote was also very close: 109 votes for the FA as the representative and 91 for no representation. All of the other campuses preferred non union status, even Berkeley. Outside of Santa Cruz, the closest vote was at UCLA: 780 votes for the FA and 824 votes for no representation.

Instead of unions, faculty wanted independent associations of Senate faculty to focus on issues, like salaries and benefits, that affected them directly, and the University, indirectly. Independent FAs could approach the UC administration and ask questions or provide information; they could also lobby members of the legislature or the Regents so that they would understand the faculty perspective on a particular issue, or, in some cases, the University perspective.

The Academic Senate, like other groups within the wider University umbrella, cannot approach the legislature or the Regents on their own because the University must speak with one voice. The Faculty Associations, as independent, dues-supported organizations, provide faculty with an independent voice not filtered through the much wider perspective of the whole University administration. The mission of the Faculty Associations was never to be antagonistic to the interests of the Senate or the University—they could never be so because membership is limited to senate faculty—but the FAs could examine faculty interests, within the larger scope of University interests, which they have done now for over 40 years.

Once the Santa Cruz Faculty Association was certified by the Public Employment Relations Board as the official representative of the faculty in the Santa Cruz division, the SCFA designated the statewide Council of UC Faculty Associations as its agent for consultation with the University systemwide administration. Under the Berman Act (HEERA) the SCFA became authorized not only to “meet and confer” with the Santa Cruz administration, on local campus issues, but also to “consult” with systemwide administration on such matters as salaries and benefits.

Here is the relevant language from 3579 (e) of the Berman Act:

“the employer shall consult with the exclusive representative of a division on matters which would be within the scope of representation or consultation of a statewide representative.”

Since the UCSC FA was voted the collective bargaining agent for that campus, it transferred its more general consulting rights to the Council of University of California Faculty Associations (CUCFA), headquartered in Berkeley. Professor David Feller became the President of the Council and the certified bargaining agent for the UCSC FA for that campus. He held that position for roughly 20 years. During this time, he was also active on University committees, in particular UCRS, the Retirement Board, in which he helped University officials address issues of the expanding retirement plan.