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WHY WE ARE SITTING IN By the time you read this, members of the Living Wage Campaign at the University of Virginia will have begun a sit-in in Madison Hall, where University President John T. Casteen III's office is located. Those students plan to sit in until the University accepts its moral responsibility and commits to paying a real living wage. President Casteen has the authority to ensure that all University employees, direct and contracted, are paid a living wage. Despite our extensive research and our repeated attempts at honest, substantive dialogue, the administration has failed to provide appropriate compensation for the entire workforce or even express a commitment to doing so. Hundreds of University workers, overwhelmingly women and people of color, are currently paid less than a living wage. Many housekeepers, dining hall workers, and other employees work a second full-time job after putting in a full day's work at UVa. It is morally reprehensible to pay poverty wages to the very employees who keep our University safe, beautiful, and functioning, when we have the resources to compensate them with dignity. As thousands of students, workers, faculty members, unions, alumni/ae, and community members have agreed, no one should face these circumstances, and we cannot permit them in our community. The Living Wage Campaign has worked since 1998 to ensure that all University employees can afford to live and raise their families in the Charlottesville community. After years of meetings and coalition-building, we believe that escalation is justified in order to force the administration to confront its responsibility for the poverty in our community. Dr. Martin Luther King wrote that "in any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action." We believe that those steps have been taken at UVa by the Living Wage Campaign, our predecessors, and our allies. Collection of Facts Our recent report, "Keeping Our Promises," presented to President Casteen and the University community, details the facts surrounding the issue of a living wage. In it we noted Charlottesville's 25% poverty rate and addressed the leadership role the University must take, as the region's largest employer, in combating that problem. The University maintains that all University employees are given opportunities to advance beyond entry-level positions, but we contend that no one should be expected to wait for promotion so that they can live in the community in which they work. We maintain that no one working full time should be forced to live in poverty. So long as any University employee earns a poverty wage we affirm that injustice exists. Negotiation We've met with administrators and members of the Board of Visitors. The Board has told us that they defer to the administration, and the administration has said to talk to the Board. Both have blinded themselves to solutions to the problem, preferring to hide behind legal excuses. Both have avoided taking responsibility for the poverty of some of the University's most vulnerable employees. Although President Casteen has expressed his commitment to low-wage workers in the abstract, he has not taken concrete steps toward ensuring that no University employee earns poverty wages in the 2919 days since he was first publicly asked to do so. The most recent resolution in favor of a living wage has garnered signatures from over 1200 students, faculty, community members, clergy, University employees, alumni, and parents. Notable signatories include Julian Bond, Delegate David Toscano, and Charlottesville's mayor, David Brown. Self-Purification Throughout this Campaign, we have been very careful to guard the authenticity of our intentions and the moral legitimacy of our methods. We have been trained in nonviolent direct action, and have undertaken it in the full knowledge of its potential consequences. We have sought a solution to the problem of poverty wages in multiple and varied ways, but we have been obstructed by the administration at every turn. We believe we have reasonably met the condition of "self-purification." Direct Action We are sitting in because we have exhausted every avenue of dialogue with the administration that could lead to a living wage. We are sitting in because UVa's wage policies threaten the economic survival and violate the dignity of University workers. And finally, we are sitting in because poverty in our community is vicious and cannot wait any longer for remedy. Our basic demand remains the same as always: All University employees, whether directly employed or hired through outside firms, must be paid a living wage of at least $10.72 per hour before benefits, adjusted at least annually to inflation and the cost of living in Charlottesville. Complete implementation also requires the following: *Prioritization of currently employed workers. In implementing the living wage policy and in related organizational changes, no jobs, wages, or benefits will be eliminated or decreased as a result. Ultimately, the University has a responsibility to all members of its Community of Trust, and if contractors prefer to disengage from the University rather than respect our commitment to social justice, the University has an obligation to prioritize the employment of any workers who work under those contractors, and ensure that their job status at the University will not be eliminated as a result. *Creation of an oversight committee. A committee should be formed to ensure fair and complete implementation of the agreed upon policy. This committee must include workers, students, faculty and administrators, and must work within the timeline of implementing this living wage policy by the first day of the 2006 Fall Semester. Because our sit-in has been seriously considered and undertaken with the best interest of the University deeply at heart, we also demand that no one suffer disciplinary consequences or civil liability as a result of participation in these acts of peaceful civil disobedience. These immunity guidelines have routinely been demanded and met in the dozens of student sit-ins that have taken place nationally during the last decade. The administration takes responsibility for ensuring that the University is a leader in terms of the students it produces, the faculty it attracts, and the research it does, but fails in the moral vision that it offers to the world. We will take that responsibility for this University that we love, and will continue to sit-in until our conditions are met. # # # The Living Wage Campaign at the University of Virginia (Press release,
April 12, 2006)
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