Oregon State Workers’ Union Rejects Latest Offer

The state’s offer of a 5.5 percent pay increase over two years for the 18,000 members of the striking Oregon Public Employees Union was rejected late Saturday as talks continued into the night.

Still, the state was hopeful a settlement could be reached by Monday, preventing the strike from entering its second week, spokesman Mark Fryburg said.

With the strike in its sixth day, workers picketed Oregon State Hospital and the Capitol, although state offices were closed. A group of red-clad strikers marched outside the gates of the governor’s mansion.

Alice Dale, executive director of Oregon’s largest state workers’ union, said the state’s offer was unsatisfactory.

Dale said the state’s latest proposal offered a 3 percent raise July 1, with an additional 2.5 percent on July 1, 1996. It was not a better deal, she said, because it only delayed a wage increase.

“They have taken money from the first year and put it in the second year. That doesn’t solve any problems,” she told a rally of union members outside the rooms where negotiators were meeting.

Fryburg conceded that the state’s new offer contained no more money than its previous offer, a 4.2 percent increase effective July 1.

The union, which initially demanded an immediate 6.5 percent raise, asked Friday for a 2 percent increase retroactive to April 1 with another 4 percent July 1.

But Dale said Saturday that the union was willing to wait until July 1.

The employees want enough of a raise to cover the 6 percent of their salary that will go into their pension plan starting in July, under a measure passed by voters last November.