The University of Minnesota’s UMN AFSCME, the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees, demanded that the University of Minnesota disarm their police force and create a Civilian Police Accountability Council.
The negotiations started this month between the University of Minnesota’s management team and four unions represented by AFSCME. Within the negotiations, AFSCME demanded that “The University shall disarm the UMPD.” They also stated that, “The University shall provide annual extensive training with safety and procedures/drills to ensure employees are sufficiently trained to respond/react if an immediate and imminent danger presents, to be provided by an entity outside of UMPD (e.g. the Aurora Center), and not to be used as a justification for increasing the number of officers or funding to UMPD.”
Within the negotiations, AFSCME also requires that no one can join the Civilian Police Accountability Council if they have family member, including a step-parent, step-sibling, or half sibling, that has served in law enforcement.
AFSCME wrote that their negotiations are working towards “laying out a comprehensive vision for a workplace that ensures health and safety for EVERYBODY at the University, demonstrates respect for workers, compensates us fairly, ensures the ability for remote work and flex scheduling, and proactively addresses systemic racism by expanding access to union jobs.”
The Law Enforcement Labor Services Executive Director Jim Mortenson said, “It is absolutely mindboggling to me why AFSCME would allow their membership to put items like this in a bargaining proposal to the employer, which would not only endanger the staff of the University of MN, but also the students on campus. It’s beyond hypocritical of AFSCME bargaining units to both represent police organizations and advocate for such anti-police requests with other bargaining units.”
According to the Law Enforcement Labor Services, AFSCME also represents at least 35 local police unions across Minnesota.
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Hayley Tschetter is a reporter with The Minnesota Sun | Star News Network and The College Fix. She graduated with a degree in Communications from the University of Northwestern-St. Paul. Send news tips to [email protected].
Photo “University of Minnesota” by AlexiusHoratius. CC BY-SA 3.0.
