After almost nine months of negotiations, members of Eastern’s chapter of the University Professionals of Illinois voted 227-17 in favor of ratifying the tentative contract agreement Wednesday.

Only a majority of submitted votes was needed in order to ratify the contract. There is no required number of total UPI members who need to submit a vote.

The next step will be for key university members to sign off on Article 31 Duration and Implementation. This document requires signatures from the president of the university, chair of the Board of Trustees, chief negotiators from both parties, and the president and chapter president of UPI Local 4100.

This document specifies the agreement will be effective until Aug. 31, 2012 when a new contract will be negotiated. The document also states the economic terms of the agreement will not be implemented until the required funds are appropriated by the board.

After these signatures are gained, the Board of Trustees will put the contact up to a final vote at their special meeting at 9 a.m. Wednesday in the Effingham Room of the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union.

John Allison, English professor and UPI chapter president, said he believes the vote will pass without issue.

Although the ratification was passed, only a little more than one-third of UPI’s approximate 667 members voted.

However, some of the submitted votes were not counted toward the vote because they were nameless and unverifiable, Allison said.

For the vote, members were asked to mark their choice on an anonymous ballot.From there, they sealed their vote in a small white envelope and inserted it into a campus mail envelope with their name written on the seal.

Allison said the reason for this was to be able to verify voter eligibility. All members who are a part of UPI’s bargaining unit are eligible to vote. This includes both “fair share” members and “objectors.”

“Fair share” members do not want to be associated with the union, but still pay the same amount in dues as required by law in order to still receive the protections and benefits of UPI membership.

“Objectors” are members who “really don’t want anything to do with the union and so they can file papers so they pay a little bit less,” Allison said.

He said most campuses do not allow “fair share” members and “objectors” to partake in voting; however, Eastern’s UPI chapter extends this privilege to all members of the bargaining unit.

Once Allison received the votes, volunteers from the bargaining unit opened the outer envelope, removed the sealed white envelopes and ballots, and scattered them to ensure anonymity, Allison said.

As for the UPI members who did not vote, Allison believes they refrained from voting because “they might have thought (the agreement) was going to pass because all of the anecdotal voting showed that people were mainly in favor.” Additionally, he said “fair share” members might not have felt comfortable submitting votes.

Unit B faculty member Carol Jean Dudley, who has been on the UPI/EIU negotiation team since 1999, is very pleased UPI membership voted for ratification.

“I think it’s very positive that people understand the difficulties of the economic situation,” she said. “I am so pleased the vote reflected the understanding of that fact. When we negotiate again in less than two years, I hope the economic situation will have changed. I consider it a miracle that we’ve managed a (salary) increase.”

In the agreement, the Unit A and Unit B faculty will receive a 1.5 percent increase retroactive for this year, and a 1.25 percent increase for next year.

Allison said this vote would not have been possible without the work of both UPI members and the administration during the negotiations.

“I’m extra proud of the (negotiating) team and I’m always very grateful to UPI’s contract campaign committee,” Allison said. “I’m also grateful to all the people that came to rally or attended a Board of Trustees meeting to show our team support.”

Although it has been a long process, Dudley believes the ratified contract was worth the work.

“Negotiations are never easy,” Dudley said. “I think it takes patience and willingness to cooperate.”

Shelley Holmgren can be reached at 581-7942 or meholmgren@eiu.eiu.