Cal State student workers to strike

Student workers unhappy over the California State University system’s refusal to grant fee waivers for their education plan to strike today, a union spokesman said.

United Auto Workers Local 4123 said about 5,700 student employees will picket at Cal State campuses in Long Beach, Dominguez Hills, Northridge and Pomona. Cal State L.A. and Cal State Bakersfield, which already have shut down for winter break, will be spared.

The students are hired to work as tutors and teaching and research associates. The university said it can ill afford to provide them with a free education in the midst of the current state budget crisis.

The waivers would cost the university an estimated $8 million to $11 million annually, a Cal State spokeswoman said. “They are not full-time employees; they are students who get their jobs by virtue of being students,” Clara Potes-Fellow said.

Union spokesman Scott Bailey Clifthorne said the workers are the only union members on campus denied waivers. He accused the university of withholding the waivers as a bargaining chip in negotiations with other campus unions. Cal State officials said the university has bargained in good faith.

-- Gale Holland