Butler County Community College

Butler County Community College trustees approved a contract with the union representing BC3’s secretarial and clerical employees Wednesday, July 31, ending 18 months of bargaining.

The agreement includes increases to a one-time retirement incentive payment and to first-year base salaries or hourly rates.

The increase in wages “was what really pushed us across the finish line,” said chief negotiator Brooke Witt. The union had been attempting to reach a new contract since January 2023.

Union membership was presented with the contract Monday, and voted “overwhelmingly in favor” to its terms, Witt said.

The finalized, three-year contract includes a one-time retirement incentive payment of $9,000 — $1,000 more than the college’s best offer issued in October. It also included a first-year base-salary increase to $750 from $500 for current full-time employees, as well as increases for part-time employees.

Wage increases are retroactive to July 1, 2023.

According to the college, negotiators representing BC3 and the BC3 Education Support Professionals PSEA/NEA met July 11 with a state Department of Labor & Industry mediator “attempting to settle an impasse declared in February to the Pennsylvania Labor Relations Board and continuing after an April 1 fact-finder’s report and recommendations.”

On April 17, members rejected the fact-finder’s report because of disagreements over wage increases and overall costs. In June, the union authorized contract negotiators to issue a strike notice.

“BC3’s secretarial and clerical employees have continued to work under the terms of a previous contract’s addendum that expired June 30, 2023,” a BC3 news release stated.

According to the college, the terms of the Oct. 5 contract offer maintained in the final agreement and retroactive to July 1, 2023, include 3% annual raises for all employees and starting salary increases for full-time workers to $36,542 in the first year, $37,273 in the second and $38,018 in the third.

The starting hourly rate for new full-time secretarial and clerical employees in the first year of the contract and maintained from the October offer is $20.30 for a 37.5-hour workweek, the college stated. The rate increases to $20.71 in the second year and to $21.12 in the third.

In addition, the starting hourly rate for new part-time workers maintained from the October contract offer is $16.46 in the first year, $16.79 in the second and $17.13 in the third, BC3 announced.

A retirement incentive option of a four-day workweek with a 20% pay reduction and full benefits, and the addition of three personal days for part-time employees, featured in the October offer, are cemented as part of the final contract.

“They’re happy with the results,” Witt said. “It’s a fair contract and they’re ready to move forward.”

“I’m really, really proud of this group,” she said. “They came together as a union in a showing of solidarity, and are leaving the bargaining (table) stronger than before.”