Excerpt from the Dayton Daily News
Wright State University will do “everything reasonable in its power” to reach agreement with a university bargaining unit whose members voted last month to strike if necessary, Wright State’s new president said in a campus-wide email Thursday.
“I want you to know that my leadership philosophy is that people come first,” Susan Edwards, WSU president, said in the email, which the university shared with this news outlet. “It’s a conviction that cuts to my core. It has been with great frustration that I have witnessed our university, while navigating our critical financial recovery, be forced to make choices that stray from valuing our employees as much as they deserve.”
Edwards also cautioned that a strike authorization vote does not mean that a strike is a certainty.
“Please know that does not mean there will be a strike. In fact, the university and the Teamsters will return to the bargaining table to continue these critical negotiations on Tuesday, January 21,” wrote Edwards, who was named last year to succeed former President Cheryl Schrader, who retired.
In mid-December, Tom Bellew, chief steward for Teamsters Local 957, said members approved a strike authorization 84-6.
