While the University renegotiated all aspects of the janitors contract earlier this year, only the wage portion of the guards’ contract was renegotiated after the HCECP recommendations.
Though the contract fell just short of the $11.30 hourly wage that the union had called for at a rally last Monday, Levy said one of its major selling points was that all guards would immediately receive more money.
The University will pay a $300 signing bonus to those guards that currently earn more than the new wage floor.
“Let’s face it. You always shoot high and try for the pie,” McCombe said. “At least we were sincere about that, and I felt Harvard was trying to at least make some effort and some movement.”
Levy said he thought last Monday’s rally, at which about 50 students and guards protested the University’s conduct in the negotiations, may have pressured Harvard to agree to the union’s proposals on retroactive pay dates, which had been a subject of debate.
“The rally did not get as much publicity as we would have liked it to, but it definitely was an eye-opener,” Levy said. “The day after the rally, [lead Harvard negotiator] David Jones was calling my office.”
The conclusion to six weeks of negotiations with the janitors union came one day after a Feb. 26 rally at which protesters were arrested for blocking traffic on Mass. Ave.
But Jones has said in the past that such rallies are merely publicity stunts and do not influence Harvard negotiators.
McCombe said that in addition to staging last Monday’s rally, he also wrote a letter last week to University President Lawrence H. Summers asking him to accept the guards’ wage proposals.
“I’m hoping maybe we can have a better relationship with Harvard and try to achieve respect for each other,” McCombe said.
The agreement will go into effect without a ratification vote by HUSPMGU members because only wages, and not an entirely new contract, were negotiated, Levy said.
The University is also in the midst of renegotiating wages with its dining employees union, which will be the last of the three unions to receive pay increases after Summers largely accepted the HCECP recommendations.
—Staff writer Elisabeth S. Theodore can be reached at theodore@fas.harvard.edu.