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Tentative settlement reached in community college strike

Classes could resume as early as Tuesday at Community College of Philadelphia, after a tentative agreement was reached today to end the 12-day strike by 1,400 faculty and support staff.

Classes could resume as early as Tuesday at Community College of Philadelphia, after a tentative agreement was reached today to end the 12-day strike by 1,400 faculty and support staff.

Anthony Twyman, a spokesman for the college, said the institution did not budge from its "last and final" pay offer that was on the table at the beginning of the strike on March 13.

But the agreement includes a sweetener that helped end the strike - bonuses totaling $160,000 a year over the five-year contract, said John Braxton, co-president of the union that represents full-time faculty at the college.

Braxton said the additional funds will be paid from an unspecified federal grant that was pledged by U.S. Rep. Bob Brady, (D., Phila.), a mayoral candidate whom union leaders credited with ending the strike.

But the college maintains it did not give in - that it is merely acting as the conduit for money the union raised on its own.

Members of the three striking bargaining units met tonight to discuss the offer. Bargaining units representing support staff and part-time faculty ratified the agreement, Braxton said. Full-time faculty are scheduled to vote on the agreement tomorrow.

Braxton said workers will go back to work no sooner than Tuesday.

The agreement came after 17 hours of negotiations over the weekend with a state mediator to end the stalemate, mainly over salaries.

Braxton announced the tentative agreement at a news conference at 5:30 p.m. on the steps of the college's main building on Spring Garden Street.

Twyman said the college board of trustees would vote on the settlement sometime this week, and that classes would resume Tuesday.

If the agreement is approved, the semester will be completed, Twyman said. Students will be notified this week if the classes would be extended to make up for the two lost weeks.

Twyman said the settlement included the "best and final offer" the college had made to the union. It offers 100 percent paid health care and an annual average increase of 3.62 percent during the five-year life of the contract for each of the three collective bargaining units, he said.

Local 2026 of the American Federation of Teachers was seeking annual raises averaging 3.92 percent during the next five years for all its 1,400 members in the three bargaining units.

Though the union members did not get the pay increases they sought, Jamie Horwitz, a spokesman for the American Federation of Teachers, said the strike did draw attention to persistent funding problems at the college.

"This raised the issue in the city and now they have all the mayoral candidates on record saying they're in favor of full-funding the college," he said. The college has an annual budget of $106 million.

The union represents full-time faculty, part-time faculty, and support staff. Each group has its own bargaining unit.

The walkout forced the college to cancel classes, affecting 37,000 students. The last strike nine years ago lasted a week.

Contracts for the three classes of employees expired Aug. 31. The college and the unions had resolved some noneconomic issues before then, but spent the next six months negotiating health-care and pay issues.

They settled on a health-care package several weeks ago. Employees are guaranteed no copay for premiums for the life of the contract.

But employees declared an impasse March 12 over salaries and set up picket lines the next day. Braxton and Ted Kirsch, president of the Pennsylvania Federation of Teachers who had worked with CCP union negotiators, asked Brady to get involved 10 or 12 days ago. "He kept pushing and kept people talking," Braxton said.

Braxton said he was unclear about the source of the grants that Brady had committed to raising on behalf the the college employees. "Brady went out and found that money," he said.

The college is committed to passing the bonus money on to employees as soon as the money is received, he said. How it will be distributed among employees is also unclear, he said.

The average salary for a full-time teacher at the college is a little more than $55,000, according to faculty co-president Karen R. Schermerhorn, an English professor.

According to the Pennsylvania Board of Education Web site, the college's full-time faculty earn on average about $5,000 less a year than Philadelphia School District teachers.

The starting salary for instructors with a master's degree is $35,800, Schermerhorn said.

Full professors with 10 years of experience earned $53,300 under the old contract.