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June 2006 Newsletter State Increases Faculty Pay Plan for 2006-2007 by 1.25% for a Total of 4.25%. Faculty will receive 2% in July 2006 and 2.25% in April 2007. On April 26, the Legislature's Joint Committee on Employment Relations, made up of the eight legislative leaders, unanimously approved an increase in the 2006-07 faculty and academic staff pay plan of 1.25% starting April 1, 2007. The original pay plan, approved a year ago, was 2% effective July 1, 2006 and 1% effective April 1, 2007. The additional 1.25% on April 1, 2007 brings the total for 2006-07 up to 4.25%. The governor signed the package into law May 5.PROFS has been working to keep the issue of faculty salaries before the Legislature and key state officials. Karen Timberlake, Director of the State Office of Employment Relations, called Jack O'Meara, PROFS' lobbyist, to let the faculty know about the additional increase. In June 2005, PROFS President Professor Richard Burgess (Oncology) had testified that the proposed pay plan, while welcome, would not bring faculty salaries up to the median of its peer schools. As of March 2006, UW-Madison faculty salaries were 8.8% below the median of its peer schools, compared to 7.3 % a year ago. ROFS Meeting With Regents Regarding 2007-2009 Pay Plan/Budget PROFS representatives have begun meeting with individual Regents to discuss their upcoming pay plan and budget request. On April 5, a group of 11 UW-Madison representatives of PROFS met with Regent Tom Loftus to discuss the Regent Loftus is a member of the UW Regents Business and Finance Committee and a former Assembly Speaker. It was suggested to Loftus that one solution to the budget problem might be more flexibility in funding salaries. Loftus brought this up at the May meeting of the Board of Regents. PROFS will be meeting with other key Regents in the upcoming weeks and months.
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