YSU Negotiators delay fact-finding report

The board of trustees will review the fact-finder's report on faculty negotiations and the tentative agreement with ACE on Friday.
YOUNGSTOWN -- A fact-finding report in the contract negotiations between Youngstown State University and its faculty won't be issued until Friday, a university spokesman says. The report was due to be issued today.
Walt Ulbricht, executive director of marketing and communications, said the fact-finder asked for more time to prepare the report. Negotiators for the university and the YSU chapter of the Ohio Education Association agreed not to have the report issued until Friday. The association represents 350 university faculty.
University and faculty representatives each explained their sides of the disagreement to a fact-finding officer during hearings last week. The officer's nonbinding report will support one side in the disagreement.
Ulbricht said the university's board of trustees is expected to review the report at a meeting Friday afternoon.
Union representatives did not return The Vindicator's calls to comment.
Expiration date
The association's contract with the university is set to expire Aug. 21. Faculty leadership has said it will strike Aug. 26, the first day of fall classes, if there is no settlement.
University representatives have said classes will be held even if a strike occurs.
About 370 nonteaching employees at the university, including maintenance workers and computer programmers, had been slated to strike Friday. Last Thursday, however, the university announced it had reached a tentative agreement for a three-year contract with the employees union.
Christine Domhoff, chief negotiator for YSU-Association of Classified Employees, said the association's executive committee would meet tonight to finalize language in the new contract. She said copies of the proposed agreement would then be sent to the union members.
The union is slated to vote on the new contract Thursday. The board of trustees is expected to review the agreement at its meeting Friday.