Santa Cruz County labor union prepares for a strike as contract expires

With the existing contract expired as of midnight Wednesday and no deal in sight, officials are preparing for the possibility that Santa Cruz County government’s largest labor union will strike. It would mark the first time the union has walked off the job in more than two decades. 

The county and Service Employees International Union Local 521 have been negotiating since midsummer. Members of SEIU 521, which represents roughly 1,800 county employees ranging from the behavioral health division to the animal shelter, have grown increasingly vocal over the past month, flooding board of supervisors meetings with public demands for better wages, benefits and working conditions. 

Over the past week, employees have been receiving emails about a looming strike. County spokesperson Jason Hoppin said Tuesday that county leadership is “soliciting strike plans from each department” but continuing to negotiate with the hope of avoiding it. In the event of a strike, Hoppin called it “likely” that a “significant number of services will be impacted.” 

“We are compiling lists of essential workers so that we can continue to provide any critical services community members depend on, and looking at what services will be available and what will not,” Hoppin wrote via email. “It is our responsibility to prepare for a strike, but by no means do we want one.” 

SEIU 521 Chapter President Max Olkowski-Laetz said the union’s asks are manifold. They want increased pay, a demand largely framed by Santa Cruz County’s affordability crisis, as well as what comparable counties offer their employees. The union also wants improved working conditions, which Olkowski-Laetz said have deteriorated due to high vacancy rates and increased workloads. 

A contractual pay increase is measured through what’s known as cost-of-living adjustments, or COLA, which is an annual wage increase to keep up with the cost of living. The county initially offered a 3% raise in Year 1, and 2% raises in each of the following two years. The offer meant Santa Cruz County would be the only one of its sister counties of Monterey, Santa Clara, San Mateo, Sonoma, Marin and Contra Costa to offer a combined single-digit COLA over three years — the others added up to 10 to 15%. 

Santa Cruz County last week bumped its COLA offer to 8%, and then on Monday, 11%. 

Olkowski-Laetz, a senior mental health specialist, acknowledged that the pay bump was progress, but said the county’s offer still landed short. He said the pay increase would still fall short of making it easy for him and other county employees to live where they worked. 

“It’s easy to get distracted by flashy numbers, but there is still a lot of work to do,” he told Lookout on Wednesday. “I’m going to fight as hard as I can to get the best contract possible for my people. But when the ink has dried, I’m going to be looking at my options, and it might mean not staying in Santa Cruz. If I can’t afford to live here without a second job, then the county is not investing in their own programs in a sustainable way.” 

Last Tuesday, a crowd of purple-shirted SEIU 521 members and supporters filed out of the board of supervisors meeting, holding “I’m Strike Ready” signs and chanting, “What do we want? Contract! When do we want it? Now!” Daniel Dodge Sr., president of the Monterey Bay Central Labor Council, an umbrella organization of labor unions across the region, told Lookout that employee workloads have crept up since the pandemic. 

“People are burnt out, the county government can’t balance its books on the backs of working families,” Dodge said. “A strike lasting five to 10 days is a real possibility. They are strike-ready.” 

SEIU 521 has received an estimated 1,400 strike commitment cards, an overwhelming majority of its membership and the best metric to determine members’ willingness to walk off the job. The county hasn’t endured a strike of similar magnitude since September 2002, when more than 2,000 workers walked out. That strike lasted three days before the sides settled.

In 2021, negotiations between the county and SEIU 521, occurring in the heat of the pandemic, stretched six months after the union’s contract expired; however, the sides avoided a strike largely out of altruism from the union, said Kevin Cisneros, a county mental health clinician. Cisneros said the county’s front-line workers saw the county struggle through the pandemic and the union ended up compromising on many of its asks as a sign of good faith. Cisneros said there was a sense going into these latest negotiations that the county owed the union for 2021, and that has turned up the heat on this year’s negotiations. 

“We weren’t going to leave the county dry and not work. We work in this field because we have the traits that we care about people,” Cisneros said. The county’s unwillingness to meet the union’s demands this time around has left some feeling taken advantage of, he added.

Hoppin said SEIU’s original proposal would have cost taxpayers an additional estimated $115 million over two years — by comparison, the county’s general fund is $754 million this year. Hoppin emphasized that the county is already dealing with “profound limitations on our finances.” 

“As with any round of bargaining, many factors are at play, including and foremost creating a workforce that meets the needs of the community, but also meeting community demands for programs and services in other areas such disaster response, road repairs, behavioral health services, services for people experiencing homelessness, an affordable housing crisis and more,” Hoppin said. “And we must do this with profound limitations on our finances, including a relatively small tax base, lower property tax apportionment than other counties, state mandates, unreimbursed FEMA expenses and much more.” 

Olkowski-Laetz did not offer a timeline on when the union could strike. He said the sides are now in the “fine-tuning” phase of the negotiations. When a contract is finalized, the bargaining team will bring it to the union membership, who can vote to accept, reject and continue bargaining, or strike. 

“We are so close to coming to a deal, but this final bit is going to be impossibly hard,” he said.

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