The unionized staff of the Philadelphia Museum of Art (PMA), who in October finally got a contract following a nineteen-day strike, accused the institution of reneging on a stipulated ‘longevity wage increase’ Hyperallergic reports. The union alleges that the museum’s CEO, Sasha Suda, and general counsel Al Suh, speaking at a meeting of union leaders on June 29, announced that the institution would not provide the additional salary increases agreed upon. in the contract. According to the union, the contract gave full-time staff $500 and part-time employees $250 for every five years of work at the museum, up to twenty years. So, for example, a ten-year-old full-time employee would receive a $1,000 raise on her tenth birthday and a $1,500 raise on her fifteenth.
At the meeting, PMA officials explained that from July 1, the longevity clause would only apply to workers whose five-year birthdays fell within the three-year period covered by the contract. Additionally, they noted that the increases would be fixed rather than cumulative. Thus, the hypothetical full-time employee quoted above would receive a raise of only $500 on her fifteenth birthday, the same amount granted to a colleague celebrating her fifth birthday.
“This interpretation is absurd; it will also have the opposite effect of the intent of the provision,” the PMA union said in a statement. “Instead of rewarding employees fairly and equitably for their service, management will cause even more inequity and confusion in the museum’s compensation structure.”
The museum responded in a statement, saying that “terms of longevity were established during collective bargaining, when the PMA agreed to the final contract wording proposed by union leadership, and the members of Local 397 and the PMA Board of Directors have ratified this language, which has resulted in the new collective agreement.”
“The current union demand refers to different longevity language proposed earlier in negotiations by the union and never accepted by PMA. The union never reintroduced this language in its final offer during negotiations. The written contract fully reflects the final agreement regarding longevity agreed to by both parties. »
Museum officials and union leaders have acknowledged that they are determined to resolve the issue through the arbitration process.
