Contract Agreement

We are happy to announce that the SHARE negotiating team has made a tentative contract agreement with UMMS. We will hold a ratification vote on Thursday, July 24. A “yes” vote by a majority of the SHARE members voting makes the agreement official.

Highlights of the agreement:

• 5 years (June 2013-June 2018) with annual raises, including raise for last year retroactive to June 30, 2013, and raise for this year retroactive to June 29, 2014
• Progressive “floor” raise protects lower paid employees; increases in grade maximums every year provides raise to base for people at max; structural increases for anyone falling too far behind in their grade; and additional lump sum bonuses in 2015, 2016 and 2017 for Exceeds or Outstanding performance review
• Childcare fund continues with funding every year
• Current employees continue to receive 3 Personal Days per year
• Holidays still count toward 40 hours needed for overtime
• No change in overtime rules for three 24-hour or 7-day departments: Psychiatry CCU, Animal Medicine, and Public Safety
• Joint Labor-Management committee on Career Development and Training
• No increase in parking rates without discussion with the union
• Agreement is actually two contracts, a 3-year contract and a 2-year contract, which will be voted on at the same time. (State law does not allow contracts longer than 3 years.)

This was a difficult negotiation, and our agreement would not have been possible without the active participation of hundreds of SHARE members. By responding to the surveys, wearing SHARE buttons, staying informed and giving feedback, keeping coworkers up-to-date and signing the beautiful “We Make a Difference” poster, members showed that they were paying attention and supporting their negotiating team. We believe this is the best agreement we could get at this time and we are recommending a “yes” vote.

Click here for a detailed explanation of the topics above and others. You will also receive a copy of all of this information in the mail. Please read it, ask your questions, and don’t forget to vote on July 24!

Times and locations for information meetings, and for the ratification vote, are below. There is also one more meeting this week, Thursday (July 11), at South Street, 12-2, in the USA conference room.

Sincerely,

The SHARE Negotiating Team:

Kathy Bateman                        Andrea Caceres                       Kirk Davis                   

Deb Engvall                             Jana Hollingsworth                 Sherry Nguyen            

Kris Rondeau                           Elisabeth Szanto                      Dianne Williams

Contract Information Meetings Please come on your lunch break to whatever portion of the meeting that you can. The agenda will last 30 minutes and then start again.      Tuesday, July 15          South Street     England CR                     12-2pm      Wednesday, July 16     Animal Med     AMED LRB Break Rm   12-1pm      Wednesday, July 16     Pysch CCU     CCU Conf Room             2:30-3:30pm      Thursday, July 17         LRB                Michaelson CR                12-2pm      Friday, July 18             Animal Med     AMED A-level CR          11:30-1pm      Monday, July 21          South Street     England CR                     12-2pm      Wednesday, July 23    Sherman           AS5.2072                       12-2pm If none of these meetings work for you, give us a call at the SHARE office at (508) 929-4020. We'd be happy to answer any questions you have, or to set up an additional meeting time in your particular area.

Ratification Vote – Thursday, July 24 The proposed contract is only a tentative agreement until it is ratified by SHARE members. Please come and vote on your break or lunch at one of the locations below.  You must be a SHARE member to vote on the contract. If you have not signed your membership card, you can sign up at the polls. Main Campus    10am - 4pm             Old School Lobby South Street       10:30am - 2pm        USA Conference Room                                    Psych CCU         7am - 8am               1st Floor Conference Room Psych CCU         2:30pm - 4pm          2nd Floor Conference Room Other Locations: Any SHARE member can vote at any location. SHARE members who work at offsite locations are welcome to vote at the Main Campus or at South Street, however we will also be arranging voting opportunities for members at the following offsite locations: Maple Ave Shaw Building Biotech One, Biotech Two, Biotech Four; Biotech Five Worcester State Hospital campus buildings other than CCU 328 Shrewsbury St Memorial Bedford  & N Quincy If you have questions about voting at an offsite location, or work at a location not listed above, please email Elisabeth at the SHARE office: elisabeth.szanto@theshareunion.org or call 508-929-4020 ext. 10.

Everyone is welcome to join us for the ballot count 

at 4:00pm on Thursday, July 24, 

in S1-123 in the old School building.

We are sorry, but our election rules do not allow absentee ballots.

Contract Update

The SHARE negotiating team will have good news to announce next week. Join us at an information meeting on Tuesday at the main campus or Thursday at South Street. We wish you and your family a happy and safe Holiday weekend!

SHARE Contract Negotiations: Information Meeting Dates

As we get closer to July 1, SHARE members are naturally wondering what is happening with their raises. There has been a lot of activity and discussion over the last few weeks. Please join us at one of our upcoming information meetings for an update and discussion:

Thursday 6/26     12-1:30    Main Campus - AS8.2072

Monday 6/30       12-1:30    South St - Italy Conference Room

Tuesday 7/8        12-2         Main Campus - AS5.2072 

Thursday 7/10     12-2         South St - USA Conference Room

Come to whatever portion of the meeting that you can on your lunch break. The agenda will last 20-30 minutes and then start again. If you're unable to join us at one of these times, please call the SHARE office at (508) 929-4020. We'd be happy to answer any questions you have, or to set up an additional meeting time in your particular area.

SHARE Members Standing Together

Thank you to everyone who contributed to the SHARE signature poster. Titled "We Make a Difference," the poster is impressive, with 371 signatures surrounding the text, representing 80% of SHARE members at UMMS. (Our apologies to those SHARE members who wanted to sign but didn't get a chance before we went to print.)

Through individual conversations, and multiple information meetings, the negotiating team and other SHARE activists try to talk with every member. This gives the SHARE negotiators the experiences, opinions and support of hundreds of members to draw on when they talk with management negotiators. The poster is a beautiful visual representation of that collective knowledge and support.

Delivered to Management

Members of the negotiating team, with the help of other SHARE members, delivered copies of the poster to the members of the management negotiating team and other senior leaders of the Medical School on Monday, June 2. We are asking them to help us end these negotiations. The cover letter delivered with the poster reads, in part,

[Our signature poster] is in support of a fair resolution to the current SHARE-UMMS contract negotiations, but it goes beyond negotiations. It is a positive statement about who SHARE members are, and what they want their role in the UMMS community to be – learners, growers, earners and contributors. [...]   

These negotiations have gone on for a year, taking a lot of time from good people on both sides. Let's settle this in a way that meets the legitimate needs of SHARE members and the Medical School, and move on. There is so much important work we can do together.

In Your Department

If you'd like to display a copy of the SHARE signature poster for your personal work space or area bulletin board, you can either stop by the Old School Lobby, Thursday, June 5, 12-1:30, or give the SHARE office a call and we'll bring you one. (508-929-4020 -- leave a message if you get the answering machine.)

Thank you again for your collaboration and signatures, and for sharing your experiences and insights with our negotiating team.

Contract Information Meetings in May

Please join us for a brown bag lunch meeting to discuss the SHARE contract negotiations, the progress that has been made, and what we still need to do to settle the contract.

The agenda will take about 1/2 hour to get through, and then we start again at the beginning. Come on your break any time 12-2pm, and stay until we have wrapped around to the part you started at.

Tuesday 5/13            Sherman Building         AS5.2072

Thursday 5/15           South Street                  Finland Conference Room

Monday 5/19             School Building             Goff S2-307E/F

Wednesday 5/21      South Street                  Finland Conference Room

Contract Negotiations and Mediation

As mentioned in a previous post, SHARE and UMMS have hired a mediator to help us resolve the remaining issues in negotiations. The mediator has met with us five times so far, and we have four dates scheduled for May. We have made some more progress, and both sides remain committed to resolving the remaining issues as quickly as possible.

What is on the Table

The economic proposals continue to be difficult -- the three "time cuts" proposed by the management team (see comparison of SHARE and Non-Union personal days, vacation caps and OT) and, of course, raises. In addition to these economic proposals, the SHARE negotiating team is also pursuing agreements that support SHARE members in learning and growing in their careers at UMass.

Supporting Each Other

Eliminating a personal day, lowering vacation caps, and changing overtime rules would affect different SHARE members differently. An employee who depends on overtime to make ends meet might care most about the overtime. A short-term employee with only 2 weeks vacation time might feel the loss of a personal day most strongly. A long-term employee who has diligently saved their vacation time for an emergency might care most about lowering the cap on vacation time. As a union, we are committed to supporting each other on all of these issues. The negotiating teams are working to find solutions to these issues that SHARE members and UMMS management can both live with.

Raises

There are three aspects to negotiations about raises: the amount of the raise, its retroactivity, and the kind of raise (i.e. "across-the-board" raises for everyone, "merit" raises where your raise depends on your performance review, "step" raises that move people up through their grade over time, etc.)

One possibility proposed by the management team would be a raise that has a merit component. We have discussed the pros and cons of different raise systems in Information Meetings, and gotten some useful feedback to bring to negotiations. We have also been clear that the amount of the raise is very important, especially since many SHARE members do not make a lot of money. For the same reason, it is important to us that the raise be retroactive to last July. Thanks to all who contributed their thoughts, ideas and support. We are continuing to work through these issues at the bargaining table.

Chocolate Day(s) - Thursday and Friday

Join us to welcome spring with chocolate and good company! Co-sponsored by SHARE and HR at UMMS, Chocolate Day has been an (almost) annual event since 2005.

Thursday, April 3, Main Campus

11:30-2:00

Old School Lobby

Friday, April 4, South Street

11:30-2:00

Cafeteria Kiosk

Contract Negotiations Update

1. Raises

The last few negotiating sessions have been about raises -- both about how much the raises will be, and about how they are structured (the same for everyone, or performance-based, etc.) The SHARE team is currently reviewing a proposal by the management team that would link raise amounts to performance evaluations. We are collecting feedback from SHARE members at information meetings and in individual conversations. Please join us at a meeting, or call or email the SHARE office if you would like to discuss anything about contract negotiations.

2. Engagement

SHARE is interested in opportunities for employees to learn and grow in their careers at UMMS, and to have their contributions recognized. We have discussed these issues in negotiations, and are looking for ways to work together with the School to support employees' full participation in the workplace. Later this month, UMMS will administer a "Diversity Engagement Survey". We encourage everyone to fill out the survey.

3. Contract Information Meetings

Please come to one of the upcoming SHARE information meetings to get an update and give your feedback on raise ideas, ways UMMS could increase employee engagement, and other contract issues. (See previous post for times and locations.)

4. Mediation

SHARE and UMMS have requested the help of a mediator in contract negotiations. Employers and unions often use mediators to help make negotiations flow better, and go faster. The role of the mediator is not to tell either side what they have to do, but to offer ideas and facilitate the conversation between the management team and the union team.

Contract Information Meetings

Please join us at one of the upcoming information meetings about the SHARE contract. We will discuss where we are in negotiations, ask for your feedback on contract issues, and answer questions.

Tues 3/11     12-1:30     LRB, Michaelson Conference Room
Thurs 3/20    12-2          Sherman Building, AS5-2072
Tues 3/25     12-2          South Street, Australia Conference Room

SHARE members can attend information meetings on their own time. Come when you can. These are "rolling meetings" -- if we are halfway through the agenda when you get there, we will go through to the end and start again at the beginning so that you can hear all of it.

Bring your lunch, any questions you have, and a friend!

Scholarship Opportunity

SHARE got a letter recently announcing scholarships that SHARE members can apply for, and an application form to make available to you. Check it out, if you have a child or a grandchild are headed to college!


To: All Affiliated Locals of the Central Mass AFL-CIO, 

We are pleased to announce that we will be awarding six $1000.00 scholarships as well as a number of $500 Platinum sponsored scholarships.

The scholarship recipients will be drawn by lottery at the May community services committee meeting and the winners will be announced at the Annual Scholarship Golf Tournament on Friday, June 6, 2014.

The scholarships will be presented at the Labor Day breakfast, September 1, 2014.

To be eligible, the student must be a 2014 graduating high school senior going on to college and a child, grandchild or member whose local is affiliated with the Central Ma. AFL/CIO. Union members must live or work in the jurisdiction of the Central Ma. AFL/CIO.

All names must be submitted by April 25, 2014 and returned to:

Paul Soucy

AFL/CIO Labor Community Services

Central Ma. AFL-CIO

400 Washington St

Auburn, Ma. 01501

If you are a SHARE member at the hospital, you are a member of SHARE / AFSCME Local 3900. If you are a SHARE member in the Medical School, you are a member of SHARE / AFSCME Local 4000. Both SHARE locals are affiliated with the Central Ma. AFL/CIO.

Please click here for a printable .pdf version of the application form to send to Paul Soucy at the above address.

Overtime Rules, Vacation Caps and Personal Days for SHARE members

Last week the HR Capsule included a notice that the Overtime Policy had changed, causing some confusion among SHARE members and their managers. Please Note: That policy did change for many employees, but the changes do not apply to SHARE members.

Overtime is one of the issues that we are discussing in contract negotiations, along with all the other policies that UMMS has changed for non-union employees over the course of our 3-year contract. UMMS is proposing all of these policy changes to SHARE. These policies may or may not change as a result of negotiations but, if they do, no changes will take place until:

1. The SHARE negotiating team reaches a Tentative Agreement with the UMMS negotiating team about all the issues on the table as a package: policies, raises, training and career development, etc.; and  
2. SHARE members vote to approve the Tentative Agreement.

The three policies that UMMS wants to change that would have the biggest impact on SHARE members are Personal Days, Overtime, and Vacation Caps. These have all changed for non-union employees, and SHARE members have sometimes been mistakenly told that the "new" policies apply to them. So, to be absolutely clear, please see the chart below:

Non-union employees	SHARE members
2 Personal Days/year Vacation Cap = 240 hours/year Overtime paid for: ·         hours over 40 in a week ·         only hours worked	3 Personal Days/year Vacation Cap = 320 hours/year Overtime paid for: ·         hours over 40 in a week  or hours over daily shift (of at least 8 hrs) ·         hours worked or paid as vacation, holiday or personal time

January Member Meetings

Join us on your lunch break to discuss SHARE-UMMS contract negotiations:

• Mon 1/13  12-2 PM   South Street, England Conference Room
• Fri 1/17     12-2 PM   LRB, Michaelson Room
• Wed 1/22 12-2 PM   Sherman Building, AS8-2072
• Thur 1/23  12-1 PM   Animal Medicine, LRB Conference Room
• Mon 1/27  12-2 PM   South Street, England Conference Room
• Tues 1/28 12-1 PM   Animal Medicine, A-Level Conference Room

If these meetings are not convenient, give us a call and we'll work with you to schedule a time and place that is more convenient. The number for the SHARE office is 508-929-4020, or you can email share.comment@theshareunion.org.

Dues Increase for 2014

SHARE bi-weekly dues will increase in January:

• The regular dues rate for 2014 will be $16.48/paycheck (the 2013 rate is $16.25)
• For employees budgeted for 20 hours/week, the 2014 rate will be $12.37/paycheck (the 2013 rate is $12.21)

Below are some Frequently Asked Questions about dues:

Why are the dues going up now, even though we haven't gotten a raise yet?

The dues increase is set by our national union, AFSCME (American federation of State, County and Municipal Employees). Any rate change is in January of each year.

How much do the dues increase each year?

The dues increase is calculated by AFSCME, based on the average raise that all 1.5 million members across the country got in the previous year. Many of AFSCME's members have had small, or no, raises over the past few years, and some have had pay cuts or unpaid furloughs. This has resulted in small, or nonexistent dues increases over the past few years, even though SHARE members at UMass Medical School were getting raises.

dues rates stayed the same from 2010 through 2012

Where do the dues go?

Most of the dues go to pay for the SHARE staff, the office rent, office supplies, mailings, etc. That money supports the work of the union here at the Medical School (and in our sister unions at UMass Memorial, Harvard University, and the Cambridge Health Alliance):

• helping members with issues at work, 
• building connections across the campuses, 
• supporting people who have been laid off, 
• distributing information about issues of importance to SHARE members (like H59), 
• negotiating contracts, etc. 

A portion of the dues goes to the national union in Washington -- they spend that money on advocating for AFSCME members as a whole, including research for things like workplace safety and lobbying for policies that help workers, like the FMLA. Support for political candidates comes from AFSCME's Political Action Committee, not from dues money. 

Report from the H59 Public Hearing

Members of the SHARE leadership team recently traveled into Boston for the open hearing on House Bill 59, Governor Patrick's proposal to change the structure of the Retiree Health Benefit for State Employees. (For background, please see this previous post about the details of the bill, and this update about the status of the bill, prior to the open hearing, which includes information about how to be involved.)

I'll do my best to provide meaningful highlights. The hearing went several hours longer than the two hour scheduled meeting time, and there were plenty of colorful details. Hundreds of opponents to H59 filled Gardner Auditorium on Beacon Hill. Although the status of the bill is not yet certain, and no one can know what subsequent proposals might target State Employee benefits in the coming years, I think SHARE members have good reasons to be optimistic that their Retiree Health Benefits will not be taken away as a result of this particular bill. To pass it, the outgoing Governor has a lot to overcome, and not much time to do it. Most members of the Committee reviewing the Bill, The Joint Committee on Public Service, expressed grave concerns about the spirit and structure of the cost-shifting involved in the bill. (Representative James Miceli likened the "shifting" to "shafting.") Though the Committee's questions were measured, and seemed genuinely to get at understanding all of the arguments involved, I didn't hear any individuals on the Committee mention any support for the bill; some explicitly stated that they would not support it as it is written. 

Members of the Committee first heard from Glen Shor, Secretary of the Executive Office for Administration and Finance, and his panel, to explain the rationale behind the bill. They explained that, unlike the State Pension program, the Retiree Health Benefit is unfunded, and that their current calculations show that the Benefit represents a 46 billion dollar liability for the state of Massachusetts. They explained that the bill is designed to bring costs in line by year nine of its implementation, and save one billion, cumulatively, by the end of that first decade. Due to the grandfathering clauses, the state would not fully realize the financial impact of the bill for roughly thirty years. (It's worth noting that there was grumbling both from the audience--and from the Committee itself--about the lack of quantifiable details regarding the proposal from the Secretary's panel. Senator Dan Wolf put it most plainly as he searched for answers about how the Bill would affect individuals, noting that Massachusetts employees are entitled to a sustainable State budget, but not at the expense of "sustainability around the kitchen table" as they calculate their home budgets.)

Many, many groups and individuals testified, representing towns, taxpayer groups, unions, and employee advocacy groups. The committee heard from UMass employees at various campuses. Shawn Duhamel, of MassRetirees, (who has visited the UMMS campus to talk with employees and members of Human Resources about H59) testified alongside the AFL-CIO. Even Ebba Hierta, the library worker who created the popular Facebook page, Stop Massachusetts Bill H59, came to explain how passage of the Bill would force her to retire from the job she loves, several years earlier than she intends . . . and at greater cost to the State, since it would be paying her benefits sooner, in addition to the wages and benefits of her replacement. 

The long conversation flushed out several concerns and criticisms. In addition to those mentioned above, these included:

• Many, many references to the broken promise to State employees who have worked diligently, and made career choices, based on assumptions that they would qualify for the Retiree Health benefit.
• Concerns that passage of the Bill could create unforeseen costs to the State in the form of litigation, resulting from that broken promise. (One such case in Rhode Island is not yet resolved. Opponents promised similar litigation in Massachusetts to block the implementation of Bill 59.)
• Worries that the structure of the Bill's implementation creates several "cliffs." In other words, the milestones and cutoffs created in the bill would make it so that employees with similar demographics, who might have had very similar lengths of service, would experience very different retirement benefits, requiring some to retire early, requiring others to work several years longer than they had planned, and simply leaving others in the lurch with no coverage whatsoever.
• Concern that the provisions of the bill rely on the Affordable Care Act to offset some of the impacts, even though the Affordable Care Act hasn't yet been fully implemented, and faces obvious challenges of its own.
• A preference to directly address the issue of skyrocketing healthcare costs, and create actual savings, rather than shifting costs from the State on to its employees.
• The need to consider more progressive ways of addressing the liability, which are unfairly weighted against lower-wage earners and women, whose caregiving obligations can sometimes make it impossible to reach the new 30-year requirement created by the Bill.

We'll keep at this, and will keep you posted. Please contact me (kirk.davis@theshareunion.org, OR 508-929-4020 x18), if you have specific questions, or would like to talk about the open hearing and H59.

Retiree Health Reform Update--Open Hearing this Thursday

SHARE members, like other employees of the State of Massachusetts, are vested in the pension after 10 years of creditable service. Currently, they are also eligible, upon retirement, for retiree health insurance. House Bill 59 proposes to change the eligibility for retiree health coverage. (Please see our previous blog post for full details of the Major Changes Proposed to the State Retiree Health benefit.)

On the plus side, it appears unlikely that the bill will be passed into law in the next few weeks before we reach the end of the current legislative session. If the issue is revived in the next legislative session (as it might be, since the benefit represents an estimated 84 billion dollar unfunded liability), the political landscape of the election year is likely to yield changes in any proposal that might be made.

That said, we want to make sure that the policy-makers know how important this is to SHARE members. We know that many of you have made important decisions about your careers and livelihoods with the idea that you would have access to the benefit as it is currently offered. Although the current version of the bill provides exclusions for State employees nearing retirement with certain amounts of service, if it were passed as-is, the effects on the Retiree Health Benefit would be dramatic and would affect most SHARE members.

House 59 is currently being reviewed by the Joint Committee on Public Service. The lawmakers on the committee have scheduled an open hearing for public comment. The hearing will be held October 31st, at 11am, in the Gardner Auditorium of the Massachusetts State House in Boston. SHARE leadership will be attending, and welcome members to join us on Beacon Hill that day.

In addition, if you would like to make a personal appeal to the Chairs of the Joint Committee, or to your local elected official, we encourage you to write to them to let them know who you are, what the Retiree Health benefit means to you, and that you're paying attention to the outcomes. 

Please call the SHARE office at 508-929-4020 x18 if you have questions or thoughts. Below you can find email addresses for the Chairs of the Joint Committee on Public Service. Online you can also find a full list of the names and contacts for the Joint Committee Members, and contact information for your local elected officials.

JOINT COMMITTEE ON PUBLIC SERVICE 

SENATE MEMBERS:
William N. Brownsberger, Senate Chair: william.brownsberger@masenate.gov
Michael J. Rodrigues, Senate Vice Chair: michael.rodrigues@masenate.gov

HOUSE MEMBERS:
Aaron M. Michlewitz, House Chair: aaron.m.michlewitz@mahouse.gov
John J. Lawn, House Vice Chair: john.lawn@mahouse.gov

Agenda for October SHARE Member Meetings

1. Contract

a. How long will this take?

b. Raises:

• when, how much, and retro
• mins and maxes, structure, and merit
• evaluations

c. Other things SHARE would like to do:

• education, training and career development
• work-life-family balance
• “engagement”

d. The 3 big “time” proposals from the management team:

• Overtime
• Vacation caps
• Personal days

e. Other policies discussed so far:

• Performance Appraisals, Admin Decision, Emergency Assistance Fund, Internship, Contact with News Media, Personnel Action Approval, Transfer of Service to/from UMMS, Equal Employment Opportunity, FMLA & unpaid LOA, Employee Classifications, Inclement Weather, Work Injury

2. What Else is Going On?

a. Layoffs

• Library
• others

b. H59

• MA bill to change the retiree health benefit
• public hearing October 31

c. Ballot initiatives

• minimum wage
• paid sick time

Contract Information Meetings

Please join us on your lunch break to discuss the latest in contract negotiations with UMMS. Bring your questions, your lunch, and your friends!

Oct 2nd, 2:00-4:00       WRCH                            1st floor conference room

Oct 7th,  12:00-2:00     South Street               Sweden conference room

Oct 8th, 12:00-2:00      LRB                                 Michelson conference room  (1st floor, on the left)

Oct 9th, 12:00-2:00     Main Building             S1-123
Oct 21st, 11:30-1:30    Sherman Building     AS5-2072
Oct 23rd, 2:30-4:00     WRCH                            1st floor conference room

If these meetings do not work for you, give us a call and we'll work with you to schedule a time and place that is more convenient: 508-929-4020.

Contract Negotiations

This week we began negotiations for our next contract. We will try to post a quick update every week or two throughout contract negotiations. If you have questions, please talk to a SHARE rep in your area, or call the SHARE office at 508-929-4020. (At the bottom of this post is a list of who is on the negotiating teams.)

Our first session was productive. The members of the SHARE negotiating team and the members of the management negotiating team introduced themselves, we agreed on groundrules for negotiations, the management team made a presentation on the Medical School's strategic goals, and the SHARE team made a presentation about who SHARE members are and what we care about.

We have grouped our hopes for this contract into four broad categories:

1. Money
2. Career development, training and education
3. Work-life-family balance
4. "Other"

Raises are generally the last issue resolved in negotiations (even though they are generally the first thing people want to know about) because management will want to know the total cost of everything in the contract before committing to an amount for the raises.

We plan to focus in on each of the four areas, starting next week with career development. Members who responded to the survey were enthusiastic about the idea of more opportunities for growth and learning, and we are hopeful that we can work with the School to make progress in this area.

If you have not yet taken the Contract Survey, it is not too late! Click on the tab at the top of the page marked **2013 NEGOTIATIONS SURVEY**. If you have taken it, thank you. The responses we received are very helpful in shaping the SHARE team's approach to negotiations. Stay tuned for survey results in an upcoming post on this blog, and for a schedule of the next round of member meetings.

SHARE Negotiating Team

The SHARE negotiating team consists of the elected leaders and staff of SHARE:

Kathy Bateman, Executive Board at large (MaPS)
Andrea Caceres, SHARE
Kirk Davis, SHARE
Deb Engvall, SHARE
Peter Fallah, Vice-President (IRTP)
Jana Hollingsworth, SHARE
Paul Julian, President (Library)
Sherry Nguyen, Treasurer (DES in Auburn)
Elisabeth Szanto, SHARE
Alana Wesson, SHARE
Dianne Williams, Secretary (Psychiatry)


UMMS Negotiating Team
The Medical School management negotiating team consists of department managers and representatives from HR:

Erin Cummings (HR)
Tim Cummins (CPS)
Jane Fama (Library)
Marc LaBella (HR)
Kristin Mullins (HR)
Jodie Nosiglia (HR)
Justin Peristere (CPS)
Bill Schmiedeknecht (HR)
Bill Tsaknopoulos (Facilities)

Things to Do: Wright's Chicken Farm Review

Maybe you remember the movie and book reviews from past SHARE-UMMS newsletters? Maybe you've enjoyed something gooey on a SHARE Chocolate Day in one of the previous years? In that spirit--and in an effort to elevate and venerate the creative and cultural soul of the SHARE union--we present the first ever review to appear on the SHARE blog: Kathy Bateman's review of Wright's Chicken Farm! 

.

Wright's Farm Restaurant, located in Harrisville, Rhode Island, is a home-style, all-you-can eat chicken restaurant and is open year round, but is only open Thursday - Sunday.   The menu contains only two menu items:  Chicken Dinner and Steak.   Adult dinners are $11.75 per person, children’s meals, ages 2 – 10, are $6.75 per person, and children under 2 are free.     The chicken dinner is standard for everyone, salad, rolls & butter, shells and red sauce, hand cut hom-made French fries and chicken.  The steak dinner is a 16 oz sirloin for $20.00 – the steak itself is not all you can eat – but all of the other sides are all you-can-eat.  To make a reservation, you need a minimum of 10 people and, if only 9 in your party show up, you would have to wait your turn to be seated with the rest of the customers who did not have reservations.  I’ve heard the wait can get long.  So we made reservations for 18 people at 4pm for the Friday after Christmas.  

a peek into the dining room

We arrived about 15 minutes early to a very large, nearly empty parking lot.  We entered through the gift shop entrance, went through the waiting area up to the host, and gave our party name to the maitre’d.  We let him know that one car in our party would be arriving a bit late.  He said that was not a problem, told us that our table would still be available but that we could only be seated once the whole party arrived.  He showed us the lounge area that we could wait in or that we could visit the gift shop while we wait for the rest of the group.  The lounge area was large with only one couple sitting at a very long bar having a drink; and, at several tables in the lounge, people were waiting - possibly for the rest of their party to arrive - because the doors had just opened at 4pm and there was plenty of available seating.   

We decided to go into the gift shop and browse.  The gift shop is big with lots of nooks and crannies filled with a huge selection of items!  Christmas decorations just happened to be 50% off when we went!  A huge selection of Fudge made on right on the premises, all sorts of candy - including old-school candy, you could purchase frozen chicken pies,  they sell jewelry, purses, sports paraphernalia, nick-knacks, children's toys, novelty toys, stuffed animals, books, so much stuff you could spend several hours just looking!  We glanced up and noticed the rest of our party had arrived.    It was difficult tearing ourselves away from the gift shop – we were having so much fun and hadn’t gotten a chance to see everything in the store! 

We approached the maitre’d to inform him we had all arrived and were seated immediately - towards the back of the restaurant.  We told them when we made the reservation that we had about 6 children, so we were seated just outside of the main area.   It worked out well - the children were able to get out of their seats stretch their legs and not disrupt anyone in the restaurant.  The dining room was large, clean, well lit and nicely done.  Our rectangular tables were set side by side in two rows, and each row had its own waiter.   We were welcomed quickly and the drink order was taken first - drinks are not included in the price of the meal.   Soda can be purchased by the pitcher, by the glass or a beverage can be ordered from the bar.   Our salad and rolls arrived at the same time the drinks did.  The salad was nothing fancy, just a regular garden salad with Wright's Farm dressing and came with lots of rolls and butter - and so far, it was all good.      We had anticipated that all of the food items would be brought to our tables at the same time as the salad and rolls, but the waiters stood by our tables, and offered us more salad and rolls.  I admit that I was a little disappointed because I thought that everything was going to be brought out to us all at once and that empty bowls would be refilled as soon as they were empty, but it soon turned around quickly.   When everyone had their fill of salad and rolls, the rest of the meal was put out on the table all at once, baby shells in red sauce - (no meat in the sauce but plenty of thick red sauce that clung to the pasta just right - and cheese to sprinkle over it), French fries, and chicken.    

I reached for the French fries first. The French Fries were like none I had ever tasted before.  Homemade from a white Russet potato, fried to a dark golden crispy outside and soft on the inside with an indistinguishable sweet flavor.  The malted vinegar, used in place of ketchup, finished the fries off!  Next, the chicken - it was cooked golden to medium dark brown in color and looked moist, tender and scrumptious!  My first bite was of a piece of the skin – (admittedly, it’s my favorite part of the chicken!).  Immediately I thought, "Uh Oh, this is too salty", but the meat itself was not salty at all - it was only the skin that was salty from the spices that the chicken marinated in and then gets baked.  The meat was very moist and delicious, not greasy at all!  I really loved the flavor and texture chicken.  It was prepared in quarters - the leg and thigh together and the breast and wing together.  During the 1 hour and 15 minutes that we spend eating dinner, our waiters stood by our table the whole time just waiting to serve us more, and we did eat. . .

 Once we ate our fill of the meal, one person ordered dessert - my 3 year old granddaughter, Lexi.  It was a slice of ice cream roll, and it had crunchy chocolate bits surrounding the outside of the roll of vanilla ice cream with chocolate ice cream in the center of the roll, shaped as . . . you guessed it, shaped as a chicken!  The restaurant offers only ice cream for dessert at a reasonable cost of $1.00.

 Everyone in our group really enjoyed the Wright's Farm Restaurant and we all plan to go back again sometime in the future.  I think it might become a tradition.



PS  - just to let you know how busy it is on a Friday, when we arrived in the large parking lot at 3:45 pm- it was mostly empty -   at 5:30 when we left - the parking lot was so full that cars were driving around waiting for people to pull out of spaces so they could park.   The restaurant was completely full and the waiting area was packed.  It is a must to put on your bucket list if you have not been there yet!

 Kathy Bateman, Pathology

.

Incidentally, I have it on good authority that Kathy makes a mean batch of brownies, too. And yes, you read that right: this is a review from over the Winter holidays. Now that we've got our new blog up and running, we're looking for more. If you'd like to share with SHARE a restaurant review (or a book review, or a movie review, or a roller-coaster review, or other idea) please send it to kirk.davis@theshareunion.org. (I'm also on the hunt for other food-related writing from SHARE members . . . for example: recipes, holiday meal remembrances, brown-bag lunch tips, notes on recent nutrition research--and, especially--fun tales of kitchen disaster. Thanks!) 

Coincidence at Nu Cafe

Do you like science and beer? Yes? Then here's a thing that will be fun: Science Cafe Woo (#2)!  

This talk, "Accidents Happen: Serendipity in Biomedical Discoveries," will be the second installment from our local neighbors in the Science Cafe Woo group, which meets occasionally at the Nu Cafe on Chandler Street. 

On their Facebook page, the SCW writes: "Join us in conversation with Dr. Allan Jacobson from UMass Medical School. Dr. Jacobson will discuss why it is worthwhile to study basic science. Using his own career as an example, he will explain how the discovery of a promising new drug for the treatment of genetic disorders began with simple experiments."

The event will be held this Monday, June 17th, at 6pm. Nu Cafe is at 335 Chandler St. in Worcester. Hope to see you there!

For more details about the Science Cafe Woo, check out their page on Facebook.