Letters to the Editor
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‘CUNY Union Faces Challenge’
Professor Kenneth H. Ryesky’s letter, “CUNY Union Faces Challenge,” evidences one of the problems with public sector unionism in New York State [March 27, 2006].
In the private sector, the National Labor Relations Board serves as an investigator and adjudicator of unfair labor practices and attempts to create fair bargaining units. In New York’s public sector, under the Taylor Law, breach of representation can only be addressed through an expensive administrative complaint or law suit since the Public Employment Relations Board claims “neutrality,” a neutrality that of course benefits entrenched union interests.
The result is that in the City University of New York bargaining unit, adjuncts and full-time faculty, whose interests are often in opposition, are in the same unit, a folly that the Public Employment Relations Board has overseen.
Because the adjuncts are large in number, they can dominate the outcome of the election. The fulltime faculty’s interest in research support is likely to get short shrift under such an ill-conceived unit. But there is nowhere to turn for a review of it.
MITCHELL LANGBERT
West Shokan, N.Y.
Mr. Langbert is an associate professor in the Department of Business and Economics at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.
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