Guards Get Wage Increase

After weeks of negotiations, representatives of the University and the Harvard guards union agreed yesterday afternoon to a increase in starting wages for all museum, parking and security guards.

The agreement commits Harvard to paying all members of its guards union at least $11.15 an hour.

The agreement came on the eve of the anniversary of the end to last year’s occupation of Mass. Hall that led to wage hikes for Harvard’s lowest-paid employees. The University agreed in February to improve wages for its janitors and is still negotiating wage increases for dining service employees.

Lead guards union negotiator Matthew Levy said that the new wages were a “good faith gesture on both parts” that fell in line with the recommendations of the Harvard Committee on Employment and Contracting Policies (HCECP).

The committee—which was created as a resolution to the occupation—had called this winter for Harvard to set wages for its lowest-paid workers between at least $10.83 and $11.30 per hour.

Museum and parking service employees will earn a minimum hourly wage of $11.15 under the terms of the agreement and the University. Security guards will earn at least $12.25 per hour.

The wage figures were agreed to after the fourth meeting between the University and the Harvard University Security, Parking and Museum Guards Union (HUSPMGU)

Both wage hikes will be retroactive to July 2001, and Levy said that some employees could receive thousands of dollars in back pay.

The previous entry-level wage for guards was $8.75 an hour. Security guards, who earned a median wage of $11.97 per hour in 2001, had not had a pay raise for six years.

In July, entry-level wages for museum and parking attendants will increase to $11.35 per hour, while security guards will earn $12.70 per hour. Museum and parking attendants with three years or more of experience at Harvard will receive higher wages, although the contract sets only one rate for security guards.

While HUSPMGU President Steve McCombe stopped short of fully praising the agreement, he said he considered it a “stepping stone to success.”

Progressive Student Labor Movement member Benjamin L. McKean ’02 said he believed that Harvard’s attitude in negotiations reflected a lack of respect for its employees, though noted that any wage increases do represent progress for guards.

“I think the whole process of the negotiations reflects poorly on the University insofar as it shows that despite all the work that [HCECP] has done, the fundamental orientation of the management is still to try and squeeze workers for every single penny possible,” said McKean, who served as a member of HCECP.

McKean said he hopes that in upcoming renegotiations of the guards’ entire contract, which expires June 30, 2003, the University will reconsider its relationship with security guards in light of recent events such as Sept. 11.

The University’s just-concluded agreement with the guards “does not reflect a change in the way most people in the country have reprioritized security,” he said.

While the University renegotiated all aspects of the janitors contract earlier this year, only the wage portion of the guards’ contract was renegotiated after the HCECP recommendations.

Though the contract fell just short of the $11.30 hourly wage that the union had called for at a rally last Monday, Levy said one of its major selling points was that all guards would immediately receive more money.

The University will pay a $300 signing bonus to those guards that currently earn more than the new wage floor.

“Let’s face it. You always shoot high and try for the pie,” McCombe said. “At least we were sincere about that, and I felt Harvard was trying to at least make some effort and some movement.”

Levy said he thought last Monday’s rally, at which about 50 students and guards protested the University’s conduct in the negotiations, may have pressured Harvard to agree to the union’s proposals on retroactive pay dates, which had been a subject of debate.

“The rally did not get as much publicity as we would have liked it to, but it definitely was an eye-opener,” Levy said. “The day after the rally, [lead Harvard negotiator] David Jones was calling my office.”

The conclusion to six weeks of negotiations with the janitors union came one day after a Feb. 26 rally at which protesters were arrested for blocking traffic on Mass. Ave.

But Jones has said in the past that such rallies are merely publicity stunts and do not influence Harvard negotiators.

McCombe said that in addition to staging last Monday’s rally, he also wrote a letter last week to University President Lawrence H. Summers asking him to accept the guards’ wage proposals.

“I’m hoping maybe we can have a better relationship with Harvard and try to achieve respect for each other,” McCombe said.

The agreement will go into effect without a ratification vote by HUSPMGU members because only wages, and not an entirely new contract, were negotiated, Levy said.

The University is also in the midst of renegotiating wages with its dining employees union, which will be the last of the three unions to receive pay increases after Summers largely accepted the HCECP recommendations.

—Staff writer Elisabeth S. Theodore can be reached at theodore@fas.harvard.edu.