University of Arizona workers and administration tackle complications they face through the University's ongoing financial crisis. Union workers continue to fight for better working conditions while the administration attempts to build the college from the ground up to combat the financial shortage.
Spencer Gantt is a senior system administrator at the UA School for Animal and Comparative Biomedical Sciences. Gantt, in his work with lab staff such as graduate students and professors, said he has met several researchers who depend on the food pantry at UA.
The financial crisis at UA is causing the administration to fight against the overspending of $140 million, making the forced transition difficult for workers who want their leadership to claim responsibility.
"I've always worked at places where people are properly compensated, and they don't have to go to a food bank, and they don't have to go to a food pantry," Gantt said. "It's sad to me that I work with people who have no other choice but to get their food from there because they simply can't afford their $42,000 a year salary working in these labs. It's unacceptable."
READ MORE: University of Arizona updates financial plan to battle ongoing financial crisis
In addition to being part of UA's information technology team, Gantt is part of the United Campus Workers Arizona, a union for university employees that "unites Arizona's diverse public university workforce to address the critical issues we all face," according to UCW Arizona's website.
Gantt said he firmly believes in his work with the union because he wants to spread awareness of economic disparity on campus and demand better working conditions for employees.
"While these corporate administrators live lavish lifestyles, the fact of the matter is the vast majority of workers on campus are seeing a degradation of their quality of life and their economic mobility, and it's not fair," Gantt said. "We deserve better."
UCW organizes protests and other events sfor student workers, such as an ABOR meetings, where leadership discussed state bills and university policies at ASU's Memorial Union in February 2024.
Jeremy Bernick, the president of the Graduate and Professional Student Body and a member of UCW Arizona, said UCW Arizona garners awareness among UA, ASU, and NAU students. They work to reform university policy to ensure an equitable workplace for the entire college body, with the help of the Arizona Board of Regents and the efforts of the General Faculty Financial Recalibration Committee.
"I've been frustrated," Bernick said. "(In) my experience as a graduate student here, I primarily advocate for issues like wage and insurance because the current standard rate for a graduate student at the University is $21,750 (per year)."
Using the MIT living wage calculator, a single adult living in Tucson should earn at least $41,849 before taxes every year to live comfortably.
"There's a pretty wide gap between how students are living and how they should be, especially when they're contributing massive amounts of the teaching and research and revenue that the University produces," Bernick said.
The GFFRC presented a plan criticizing Arnold’s original financial strategy in the same meeting to cut athletic costs, lay off senior-level administrations and present other options to combat financial mismanagement.
READ MORE: UA finance committee recommends slashing athletics, Arnold confirmed interim CFO
Gantt said that during these meetings between ABOR and financial committees at UA and other institutions, the leadership at the meeting acted as if they were in a "big club" where workers at UA were omitted.
"If I was part of a governing board of the state institutions in my state, and one of the state institutions got to a $250 million deficit of cash on hand availability, I'm not sure I'd be very kind to the president when they showed up to my meetings," Gantt said.
Barry Brummund, the chief information officer and the vice president of the UA Planning Office, works in information technology to ensure the stability of the University through the campus’s equipment and online services for students and faculty alike.
"The current financial challenges that the University is facing are something shared by information technology and all of the other key stakeholder groups and employee groups in the University," Brummund said. "Does it have an effect on us? It does."
Brummund said he works with other information technology employees who face a constant work cycle throughout the year, maintaining the systems during current financial challenges.
"They're very interested in what they can do for themselves and their future and what they can do for the University," Brummund said. "So we're all learning about the financial challenges and what we're going to need to do to operate the University differently to solve all of that."
He said that the process will look insignificant to information technology workers at the start, but will create the ability for employees to advance their careers through a central IT and form opportunities to work with colleagues they usually would not be able to learn from.
Gantt said the union meetings he attends are a positive atmosphere for workers to share their experiences and struggles in the face of adversity. Gantt said seeing the struggles he and many others deal with gives him hope for the future.
He also said hearing these experiences – such as one library employee having to be responsible for the safety of a UA library in case of violence before calling the police – reminded him of how leadership expects employees to put their safety on the line for the University.
"They don't understand the struggles," Gantt said. "They don't understand having to count quarters to pay for a coffee in the morning. These people are so far removed from our society in the plight of workers that I can't ask anything of them but to step down."
READ MORE: Campus workers protest at ABOR meeting against controversial state bills
Bernick shared the same fears about having University employees assigned to do more than they were hired for.
"It seems like the answer to all of our financial problems will be disproportionately netted out to people who are working-class or are more vulnerable than those who are on the top and are probably more responsible for the choices and decision-making that led to this," said Bernick.
Gantt said he would tell administrators like President Robbins to resign after the misplacement and let new leadership repair UA's current state on behalf of student workers and staff "who genuinely care about uplifting marginalized voices."
"We have a couple of years here where we're going to have to make some changes at the UA to solve our financial challenges," Brummund said. "But the future for UA, and this is true for ASU and NAU in the state of Arizona as well, is incredible, so we'll get through this, and we'll get back to being the amazing university that we have been."
Edited by Katrina Michalak, Walker Smith and Shane Brennan
Reach the reporter at gheadle@asu.edu and @George_Headley7 on X.
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