The results of the Graduate Employees Union’s continued contract negotiations with MSU could set a precedent for whether the university offers its employees domestic partner benefits.
While union members have the benefits under their current contract, which expires May 15, the administration has asked to strike those benefits from the contract, said Sandra Schmidt, the union’s president.
One of the reasons the union has said they wish to strike the language is because it is illegal, Schmidt said.
Following the passage of Proposal 2, an amendment to the state constitution passed in 2004 that prohibited same sex marriages, the benefits became unenforceable. If the courts rule in favor of appeals to the amendment, the benefits become valid, Schmidt said.
“Until we know for certain that it’s illegal, there’s no reason to strike it from the contract,” she said.
Schmidt said the university feels that nobody utilizes the benefits now, which is not a good reason to strike the language, she said.
“It makes a very strong political statement about the vision of the university by having it in the contract,” she said.
Despite the amendment, MSU implemented benefits for Other Eligible Individuals, or OEI, in July 2007, which provided the same manner of benefits, so long as the individual has lived with the employee for at least 18 continuous months, is not a dependent and not eligible to inherit from the employee.
Although contracts for university employees outside the union have adopted the benefit system, the union’s three-year contract, drafted in 2005, still has the old benefits language.
The union wants to maintain those benefits for those in the future, Schmidt said.
“We would like to keep the language in the contract, even though it will be unenforceable until the courts decide,” she said. “But we would like a letter of agreement that places OEI benefits in the contract until we know how the courts decide.”
Whatever decision the administration comes to could have far-reaching effects for contract negotiations in the future, said Grant Littke, president of MSU’s Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender, Faculty, Staff and Graduate Student Association.
“This will show whether they plan to make OEI available to all employees,” Littke said.
“It’s being watched by us to see if they plan to offer these benefits in other union contracts in the future. This could be precedent making.”
Karen Klomparens, dean of the Graduate School, and MSU spokesman Terry Denbow declined to comment.
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