Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1980 [PAGE 211]

EXTRACTED TEXT FROM PAGE:

1979]

UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS

201

room service at the University of Illinois Hospital. T h e named defendants are Dr. Robert Seligsohn and Jean O'Neill, R.N., both of whom are on the University's staff at the Medical Center campus. As employees of the University the named defendants are entitled to protection under the University's Risk Management and Self-Insurance Program if they were engaged in the performance of University duties at the time of the alleged incident. T h e complaint seeks damages in the amount of $200,000. Pursuant to previous delegations by the Board of Trustees, the university counsel has been given interim authorization to take such steps as are necessary or appropriate, including the employment of special counsel, to protect the interests of the University in this matter and to provide representation for Dr. Seligsohn and Nurse O'Neill, all in accordance with the University's Risk Management and SelfInsurance Program. The university counsel has recommended that such authorization be ratified, approved, and confirmed in all respects. I concur.

T h e student advisory vote was: Aye, Miss Kooper, Mr. Sobotka, Mr. Watson; no, none. O n motion of Mr. Stone, this recommendation was approved by the following vote: Aye, Dr. Donoghue, Mr. Forsyth, Mr. Hahn, Mr. Howard, Mr. Lenz, Mr. Neal, Mrs. Shepherd, Mr. Stone, Mr. Velasquez; no, none; absent, Governor Thompson. Litigation Initiated by Certain Construction Laborers

(42) A complaint has been filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County (Case No. 79L 2073) by four individuals who are employed as construction laborers at the Medical Center campus. T h e defendants include the University, the "University Civil Service System Merit Board of the University Civil Service System," and Donald Ward in his capacity as the university director of personnel services for the University. T h e complaint is in four counts and seeks certain declaratory judgments and injunctive relief. The complaint alleges that the four plaintiffs are employed by the University as "construction laborers," positions which were formerly classified as a "prevailing rate" class by the Merit Board. Until October 1, 1976, they allege they received the "prevailing rate of wage" as determined by the International Hod Carriers and Building Construction Laborers' Union, Local No. 6, an affiliate of the General Laborer's District Council of Chicago, Illinois, and vicinity (the "Council"). It is alleged that the University and Director Ward entered into agreements from time to time with Local 321 of the College, University, and School Employees' Union, AFL-CIO, which provided that the wage rate for construction laborers would be the same as that fixed for "building laborers" represented by the Council. However, it is alleged that the agreement entered into with Local 321 on April 18, 1977, retroactive to October 1, 1976, provided for the payment of wage rates which were established without regard to the "prevailing rate of wages" established by the Council. It is further alleged that all subsequent agreements between Local 321 and the University have continued to establish wage rates for plaintiffs as construction laborers which are different from the prevailing rates established by the Council. Count I of the complaint alleges that in signing the April 18, 1977, and subsequent agreements the University and Director Ward have violated the provisions of the University's Policy and Rules by permitting the construction laborers as a prevailing rate class to be exclusively represented by a collective bargaining agent, by negotiating with a labor organization other than the one whose rate is used to determine the "prevailing rate," and by entering into agreements which impinge