Coping with pay cuts

By Fleur Bailey
The Guardsman

It has been more than four months since the procedure known as bumping relocated many City College clerical staff out of their jobs and into lower-paid positions. Some were even laid off.

San Francisco’s budget crisis forced the elimination of more than 470 civil service personnel from the Department of Public Health last November, bringing 32 DPH workers into City College, some with no experience working in education.

Certain public jobs in San Francisco are governed by the civil service system, which applies rules and job classifications intended to make layoffs, hiring and position seniority work in an organized way.

The school district is considered to be a city department by San Francisco’s Human Resources. Although the layoffs came from the city last year and not the school district, the results were detrimental to all involved, and many schools were robbed of their treasured secretaries.

Among them was Patricia Kimball, 59, who worked as a senior clerk typist in the music department at City College for three years. Kimball was bumped to a lower seniority position in the child development and family studies department on Nov. 30 last year.

“It was so stressful I thought I would have a heart attack,” Kimball said. “It’s not just the financial difficulties I face with taking a 17 percent pay cut. I was grieving. It was a good fit for me in the music department. I was a team member and had more creativity. It’s been rough all round.”

Kimball said she has struggled with the changes to her schedule in her new position. She said  her job at the music department allowed more flexibility, choosing some days to start work late and making it up on the weekend, giving her more time for her personal life.

“It’s hard now; I don’t have that flexibility to manage my hours,” she said. “Even my dog is affected. She wakes me up in the night because I don’t have the time anymore to walk her.”

Kimball said she has tried to help the woman who replaced her transition into her job in the music department.

“I always like to leave a relationship in good shape,” she said. “I understand about life and relationships and I believe you should always try to do what you can.”

However the union reprimanded her former boss, Madeline Mueller, head of the music department, for fear that Kimball may end up working two jobs.

Kimball now has no pay during the summer, Christmas, or Easter, and has to face changes to her medical benefits. Despite this, Kimball accepts her new role with grace and appreciation that she has managed to stay at City College.

“It’s like the goose that lays the golden egg,” she said. “City College is an important part of the community. It’s about personal development.”

The future for civil service workers may still be uncertain with the possibility of layoffs which would cause the bumping procedure to start again.

“This could happen to me again,” Kimball said. “It worries me because I’m not 19 anymore; I’m 59. I don’t have unlimited strength or the kind of energy it takes to start a new life. But I’m a survivor so whatever happens next I know I’ll come up with something.”