An amendment to the America COMPETES Act (H.R. 5116) that would force public universities with unionized research staffs and COMPETES Act funding to promptly disclose information required for contract negotiations passed the House Wednesday by a vote of 250 to 174. Proposed by George Miller (D-CA), chairman of the Education and Labor Committee, the amendment responds to the long delays that have stalled negotiations for a first contract between the University of California and the union representing the UC postdocs. At a hearing about the negotiations held in Berkeley on April 30, Miller probed a claim by UC vice president Dwaine Duckett that the university could not, after a year and a half of talks, provide certain needed employment information about the postdocs.
Universities that do not comply with the amendment's time limits would have to present a convincing explanation or risk losing funding for Facilities & Administration costs until they forked over the required facts. Funding for grants themselves would continue...
