Discrepancies in information provided by the Illinois Department of Labor concerning the contract negotiations between Eastern Illinois University and one of its unions show the department may be involved in the situation that has resulted in a federal grand jury investigation.

A supposedly minor contract negotiation between Eastern and 10 of its Steam Plant employees has ignited an investigation that has probed the involvement of top state officials, including House Speaker Michael Madigan, leaders of the Illinois Board of Higher Education, the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 399, the Illinois Department of Labor and the Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board.

Madigan, encouraged by Local 399, the union which is a significant contributor to his campaigns, held two meetings between Eastern officials and union leaders in the spring of 2001 to help bring about a close to the negotiations.

The investigation has requested information regarding those meetings as well as information about “actions or proposed actions” by state officials concerning the university’s budget “in any way related to” Eastern’s negotiations with the union.

In addition, subpoenas issued to Eastern and the IBHE have requested all information related to the application of the Illinois Prevailing Wage Act, specifically two documents issued by the labor department to Eastern that state a prevailing wage contrary to what IDOL records show.

It cannot be determined if the IDOL, Illinois Educational Labor Relations Board, Madigan or the union received subpoenas requesting similar information because they have not made such information public.

Robert Wayland, director of employee and labor relations, said the negotiations took more than a year to complete because the union was demanding a prevailing wage. In fact, he said immediately after the previous contract was up for renewal in June of 2000, the union filed a grievance with the IERLB saying the university was not bargaining in good faith because it would not offer a prevailing wage.

Prevailing wages are set according to a determination of a county’s typical salary for a specific job classification. The county determines the rate, while the IDOL is responsible for enforcing it and the IERLB is in a position to hear complaints on such issues. Classifications of jobs are determined by a collaboration between the State University Civil Service System and the

state-supported employer.

According to Wayland and the IDOL records provided online report of prevailing wages in Coles County, there is no prevailing wage in the county for the classifications of the union employees – stationary engineer and lead plant stationary engineer.

Wayland said the university was perplexed when the IDOL sent faxes to Eastern on May 29, 2001 that listed the prevailing wage for “building operating engineers” as $29.79 base pay per hour. The faxes were in response to requests from the university concerning the negotiations.

The university also received a second IDOL fax the same day that was “modified,” Wayland said. The second document changed “building operating engineers” to “building operating engineers/stationary.”

The “stationary” was added in a different font and size. Also, the line items of “chief engineer” and “assistant chief engineer” were added in a different font and size. Those classification’s list base pay per hour as $32.77 and $31.28, respectively.

There is no “building operating engineer/stationary” classification according to the civil service’s Web site.

IDOL’s Web site shows no prevailing wage for stationary engineers. Furthermore, the site lists the highest operating engineers base-pay per hour as $24.10, more than $5 per hour less than the quotes on the department’s faxes to Eastern.

There is no prevailing wage in Coles County for any classification that reaches the $29.79 per hour the IDOL faxes stated, according to the site.

In a press conference last week, Madigan stated one reason he held the now-controversial meeting between the negotiating parties was concern that Eastern was not paying the employees a prevailing wage.

Also, his spokesperson, Steve Brown, accused the university, under the lead of then-President Carol Surles’, of being “anti-union.”

The IDOL could not be reached Saturday, and neither could the Champaign or Chicago offices of the IUOE Local 399. The IERLB also could not be reached Saturday.

After the fax was received from IDOL, Wayland said “there was an attempt (by the university) to clarify,” and Eastern “never really got a response.”

“When (the prevailing wage) was issued we assumed it was accurate and legitimate,” Wayland said about the faxes received in May.

He said the university now has some “questions” about it since the faxes were attached to the subpoenas. He also added the faxes and prevailing wage discrepancies “may very well be a target of the investigation.”

Wayland characterized the increase from the then base salary of $21.76 per hour to the $29.79 per hour the IDOL quoted as “huge.”

He said if overtime and other special pay were added in the employees would easily make “well over $60,000 a year.”

The union’s negotiations with Eastern have a history of turmoil, Wayland said. When the contract last expired in 1996, it took 15 months to close. A prevailing wage was not an issue then, he says, but there was contention over mandatory staffing.

The most recent negotiation and the 1996 one have both required a federal mediator from the Federal Mediation and Conciliatory Service. Because of the on-going investigation, Wayland would not comment if state legislators played a role in the previous negotiation like Madigan had in last year’s.

Eastern and the union finally settled on a contract in September 2001. After the contract was settled, the union dropped its IERLB grievance, which by that time had been researched by an IERLB investigator and determined to have enough merit to go before an administrative law judge, Wayland said. The hearing never materialized because the grievance was retracted.

The university’s argument against the grievance from the beginning was that there was no prevailing wage set for stationary engineers.

Wayland said the IERLB, whose members include a lobbyist for Local 399, Janis Cellini, and the union’s vice president, Michael J. Gavin, “never produced” information that countered the university’s position, even after it determined the case had enough merit for a hearing.

The State University Systems Civil Service Web site states that a building operating engineer operates and maintains all of a building’s mechanical equipment, structures, furnishings and fixtures, while a lead plant stationary engineer works with equipment like building ventilators, heaters, air conditioning units, pumps and compressors.

Wayland said he never received any calls or complaints from the civil service system about Eastern’s classification of the union’s employees.

He also backed off from saying the union’s grievance charge “pressured” the university in the negotiations, and instead said it “is something you don’t like pending, particularly if you feel you haven’t done anything wrong.”

The union finally agreed to a contract that did not contain a prevailing wage or change the classification. Under the current contract, which is retroactive to August 2000 and spans to July 31, 2004, the increases average out to between 5 and 8 percent, a university spokesperson has said.

At the end of the four-year contract, the lead stationary engineer, the highest-paid position, will earn $29.15 base pay per hour. The university’s Board of Trustees approved the contract in October, saying it would result in an overall increase of $136,000.