Faculty at Blue Mountain Community College will have a three-year labor contract after a months-long collective bargaining process.
The contract, which will be retroactively applied, lasts from July 1, 2024, to June 30, 2027. It marks the first multi-year contract in years, President Mark Browning said, as the college’s enrollment and finances have stabilized.
The faculty union unanimously ratified the agreement, BMCC’s Board of Education during a special meeting Wednesday, Sept. 4, gave its unanimous approval as well. The deal will provide annual cost of living adjustments to faculty members’ salaries as well as adjustments to health insurance contributions.
“This is the result of many, many months and probably even ongoing past that — a lot of work between a lot of people here on campus,” Browning told the members of the board. “I believe it’s a good, strong agreement.”
Browning said part of the impetus behind returning to a contract that lasts more than a year was faculty representatives’ desire to have “something that helped to reassure their membership in terms of some security and longevity.”
However, the longer contract does not mean that if the college ran into financial trouble, faculty couldn’t be laid off.
The meeting agenda had called for the board to approve labor contracts for the president and the college’s classified employees — non-teaching staff members — but those votes are coming later.
The college board voted to hold off on approving Browning’s contract as it undergoes its final legal reviews. Shannon Franklin, executive assistant to the president, said in an email the classified union had not had enough time to complete its vote on the contract, so the college administration removed it from the agenda ahead of the meeting. The administration expects the contracts to go before the board during its regular meeting Sept. 18.
During the Sept. 4 special meeting, the board also approved a contract with Sage Intacct Cloud Accounting Software for $162,697 for the 2024-25 fiscal year. The company will provide the software and support for accounting and business operations starting this year, with a dedicated budget line in future years.
