University of California staff staged a three-day strike

University of California staff staged a three-day strike against austerity and privatization to support service workers. “One of the main battles AFSCME workers face is the constant threat of seeing their jobs outsourced to nonunion workers employed by for-profit companies. As the university increasingly privatizes aspects of its operations, workers employed by the institution are always looking over their shoulder, fearful that their jobs will evaporate overnight and they’ll be replaced by workers who answer to a different boss. ‘Every day we’re paying attention to when we see new faces on board,’ said Maricruz Manzanares, a custodian at the University of California at Berkeley. ‘Suddenly we see a new group of workers and we don’t even know who they are, until we talk to each other and the union and we find out they belong to a company. Lately the university has developed shady techniques. They used to do it openly, but now they’re finding ways to do it in the dark.’ Either way, she said, ‘the university does not behave as a public institution.’” Kathryn Lybarger, president of UC AFSCME 3299 and California AFL-CIO reported on the history of the local, on the effort to privatize and outsource university services, and on systemic racism.