CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA. (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) — After campus workers were removed from a collective bargaining rights bill before the Virginia General Assembly, some of those workers and their supporters are fighting to change that.

Inside the cafeteria at Charlottesville Middle School, campus workers from the University of Virginia and other supporters gathered to discuss issues and advocate for collective bargaining at a town hall event on Saturday.

The town hall was hosted by the United Campus Workers of Virginia’s UVA Chapter in partnership with UVA’s American Association University Professors, and was the first of five collective bargaining town halls run by the Virginia Public Sector Labor Coalition. Campus workers were removed from the Virginia House of Delegates’ version of a sweeping bill that aims to extend collective bargaining rights to more than half a million of Virginia’s public service workers.

United Campus Workers of Virginia President Harry Szabo said the organization was “disappointed, but not surprised,” to see that campus workers had been removed from the House’s bill.

“We knew there was a good chance our university presidents would lobby against us,” they said. “Every time that we’ve tried to negotiate with them as a group without our collective bargaining rights, they’ve been incredibly dismissed and have sometimes retaliated against us.”

Saturday’s event focused on the importance of those collective bargaining rights, featuring speakers in higher education as well as other professions sharing their experiences advocating for said rights in their respective fields.

One of those speakers was Latricia Giles, Executive Director of the Charlottesville Public Housing Association of Residents. While not directly involved into the event, so much so she wasn’t asked to speak until she arrived, but she was one of numerous Charlottesville residents at the event showing their support despite not being campus workers themselves.

In her remarks, Giles shared her own experiences watching her mother, a social worker, fight as a union member for her own worker’s rights in New York, as well as her own experiences being mistreated by her previous employer, who required her to return to her sale job immediately after she finished surgery for a torn ACL.

Giles said afterward the biggest thing she’s learned since that experience is that she had rights and should not be afraid to use them when needed, especially as the cost of living nationwide continues to rise.

“I’m valuable,” she said. “I’m not gonna continue to harm myself … That’s why this is important, so I can be protected. We all can be protected.”

Among the attendees at Saturday’s event were members of other local unions, including the Amalgamated Transit Union and Albemarle Education Association, as well as many who said they were simply friends of campus workers who wanted to show their support.

“It is important to be in solidarity with other unions for the simple fact that we’re all in the same boat,” Matthew Ray, ATU’s representative at the event, said. “We all have different contracts, of course, but we’re all the same working employees throughout the entire city and county. We’re all the same. We are stronger together.”

Doris Crouse-Mays, President of the Virginia AFL-CIO, said it was “uplifting” to know those fighting for collective bargaining were not alone.

“Our fight is everyone’s fight,” she said, “and that solidarity and unity is just really overwhelming. 
And with us all working together, we can accomplish anything.”

Home care workers were also removed from the State Senate’s version of the bill, and while Saturday’s event focused on campus workers in particular, the event’s organizers said they are advocating for both groups to be included in the final bill.

The Virginia Public Sector Labor Coalition also plans to host similar town halls for campus workers at Virginia Tech, George Mason University, Christopher Newport University, Old Dominion University and William & Mary on Saturday.