8/23 Weekly Email
Hi Everyone,
I’ve just completed my first week as UAEA President and wanted to give you a few updates. I don’t know if I’ll always have updates on Fridays but we have a lot going on right now and I know I promised to keep you all in the loop.
First, I am starting to schedule meetings with different workgroups. I’m more than happy to sit down with the members in your area and talk about issues but I’d also like to find some time to do outreach with non-UAEA members such as at all-hands meetings. I have a few areas already scheduled but would love some assistance in getting more on my calendar - feel free to reach out if this is something you or your team would be interested in. If you send me an email please let me know your department, a good place we could meet privately (ie, 2nd floor conference room at the Tempe Courts Building, 200 E 5th St), and some times/days of the week that most members of your team are free. I like to schedule meetings near the beginning or ends of shifts to minimize disruption to operations and may need to coordinate with your supervisors/managers if the times are outside that.
Second, I can’t provide specifics due to their confidentiality of our process but I want to note that the UAEA Board is working on 12 member cases across the City right now, several of which may result in Grievances. We don’t always discuss the work we do behind the scenes but I feel it’s worth highlighting that we are usually tackling 10-20 different member or department issues at once. This involves one-on-one conversations with those impacted, meetings with department managers or directors, frank conversations about policy in Labor Management Committees, and occasional legal memos that make our stance on member rights crystal clear. We encourage you to reach out if you need assistance with issues in your area - we want to make sure everyone in our organization has a safe and comfortable working environment within which they can focus on their jobs.
Third, Leah Sergeant and I have had several meetings with City Management, our attorney Kathryn Bailie, and other employee groups about the new restrictions on UB time. We are not the only Tempe employee association which will experience issues adjusting to these new restrictions - besides identifying a new source of hours to support our work we also are grappling with the administrative and tax implications of several solutions. The UAEA board will evaluate our options and should have a preferred approach in the next few weeks. I will send out an email then with additional information about the implementation as well as a survey asking for member feedback about your preferences.
Fourth, The new UAEA website is up at uaeatempe.com. You can also access it at the old link of uaeatempe.org but we will be using uaeatempe.com as our primary email address moving forward. As I mentioned last week this is the first version of our website but should give you an idea of what’s to come. I don’t have a timeframe but my goal is to build a private member’s area where you will be able to view recordings of our member meetings and access private union correspondences whether or not you have access to your City Email. If you have feedback about the website or ideas for new functions please hold off on those for now - we’ll likely have our IT committee review those and make recommendations for implementation once they’re established.
Fifth, I wanted to notify members with children of a impaired-driving workshop City of Tempe is putting on this coming Thursday (August 29th), at the Tempe Center for the Arts. This workshop is designed to help reduce traffic fatalities and injuries - apparently 30% of the serious traffic incidents in Tempe in 2023 were due to the impairment of drivers. Check out more details and find the signup at the following link.
Sixth, I wanted to remind people that Covid and Flu season are right around the corner. This might seem like an early reminder but almost everyone in my family has Covid right now and I imagine some of our members may be experiencing similar situations. If your area currently does not have masks or hand sanitizer and you want to minimize your risk the employee warehouse has supplies. Check with your supervisor before reaching out (they or someone else in your department may have already done so), but you can contact the warehouse through the online ordering system found on the Bridge under “Service Requests” or the following link Wasp Warehouse Order App - Power Apps. You can also call them at ext. 2679 or 2643. You will need to know your cost center to order - supervisors should have that for you. Let UAEA know if you experienced pushback from your supervisors or were otherwise unable to get supplies and we’ll touch base - your safety is always a priority.
Finally, I wanted to formally announce the 2024 UAEA Scholarship winners. These were meant to be announced at this coming Monday’s City Council meeting but the event was unfortunately canceled - that said, we still want to recognize their incredible work.
The Jacquelyn "Jackie" Awosika Scholarship Program distributes funds each year to high-achieving students entering or already accepted to college. Applicants must be either a UAEA member or a child of a member and are required to submit an original essay, academic transcripts, and a summary of their honors, awards, community service, and/or other notable extracurricular activities. Applications are then anonymized and reviewed impartially by a scholarship evaluation committee.
UAEA has awarded this scholarship for several years now and I am delighted to announce that this year for the very first time our team chose to recognize 3 separate students for their exceptional performance. I want to stress that all of our applications were incredible but these three finalists demonstrated the highest caliber of scholastic attainment and we are excited to see where the future will take them.
The winners are as follows:
Maddy Makay, child of City of Tempe employee Brady Makay.
Maya Taylor, daughter of City of Tempe employee Kelly Taylor.
Jude Odell, son of City of Tempe employee Shandy Odell!
We appreciate everyone who submitted applications and encourage either members in college or members with children entering college to apply again this coming year.
With that, I think everyone is up to date on UAEA. Again, please reach out if you’d like me to visit your workgroup sometime in the next few weeks - I’m going to try to visit everyone in the next month but will certainly prioritize those groups which have expressed an interest in seeing me.
Bye for now.