One October day in 1997, Peg Kramer read a newspaper article with her son, and nothing — for her or the University of Texas — has been quite the same since.
Kramer, a longtime single mom, former insurance professional, lifelong sports nut, and dedicated UT staff member, was the new president of a very sleepy University Staff Association (USA). Morale among the approximately 12,000 staff members was low, and frustration was high. Staff salaries had long been a bad joke at the university, and pressure was building for something to be done about it.
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Back in 1996, long before Kramer became USA president, the university administration hired Buck Consultants to survey UT staff salaries, ostensibly to establish a baseline comparison with the Austin labor market as a whole. Like many staff members, Peg Kramer saw the Buck Study as the administration’s acknowledgement of the salary problem and their tacit indication that they would deal with it.
“I had participated in the collection of the wage data.” Kramer says. “I filled out my form with the hopes that somehow things were going to change over a period of time. There was some type of vague assurance that if we completed these forms, UT was really going to do something.”
Prior to Kramer’s involvement, USA had been primarily a service organization. Though she knew she wanted USA to become more involved in real staff issues, she had not fully formed her agenda as the group’s new president. “I hadn’t thought about fair wages until that point, until it was in the paper, it was out in the open.”
“That point” was the day in October, 1997, when Kramer and her 13-year-old son read an article about the Buck results in the Austin American-Statesman. Months earlier, UT staff began clamoring for the long-overdue Buck Report, only to have the administration stonewall them. Staff members finally resorted to filing a Freedom of Information Act request. Still, the administration appeared to be trying to hide the results of the report, until they apparently realized how embarrassing this looked in light of the article’s impending publication. It was only then that UT hastily informed employees they could finally obtain the Buck Report — provided they had $30 for each copy.
Though already familiar with some of the report’s findings, Kramer has described reading the newspaper article with her son as a personal turning point. “I read it in the paper, and he looked at it and read it,” she remembers. “I had just gotten elected. We hadn’t had our first board meeting yet. And he said, ‘What are you going to do about this? You’ve been complaining about the way things are going at UT ever since you’ve been there. What are you going to do about it?’ And at that moment I got goosebumps. Him saying that, this kid that I’ve been raising so long on my own, that really told me something. He’s not a political kid, but he says, ‘What are you going to do about it?’ It was almost like every ounce of me decided, ‘You’re gonna do whatever it takes. You’re gonna stop complaining about this shit behind closed doors. You’re gonna do something.'”
Clearly, something needed to be done. To the surprise of absolutely no one except perhaps Longhorn mascot Bevo, the Buck Study proved that most UT staff were underpaid, and grossly so. UT salaries were 17% below comparable salaries in the Austin market, meaning many UT careerists earn nearly 20% less than newly graduated UT students who land similar positions in the private sector. More aggravating still, Buck showed that a tiny upper echelon of staff, those earning above $65,000, were making 3.5% more than the Austin average.
The administration’s reluctance to reveal this information was telling; when push came to shove, they had no intention — much less a plan — to remedy the situation. But until Kramer, push had never come to shove; though unhappy with their lot, the staff had almost become conditioned to accept that nothing would ever change.
That is no longer the case. With Kramer’s leadership, USA has become an increasingly activist and media-savvy organization. Last spring they held a March for Fair Wages from the UT Tower to the Capitol. In November they staged a “speak out,” where staff members lined up on the West Mall to relate personal stories of financial hardship and unfair employment practices for all passers-by (and the media) to hear. Early in ’99, USA will mount a “virtual walkout,” when staff members will perform their normal duties under conspicuous signs of protest. (An actual walkout would be illegal since university employees have neither collective bargaining rights nor the right to strike.)
Kramer has not been afraid to put her head in the lion’s mouth. She spoke on the equity problem to the UT Board of Regents, the first time ever that a non-managerial staff representative has addressed that powerful body, and more than once she has sat across the desk from UT President Larry Faulkner in his imposing Tower office. “I think those situations are set up to intimidate,” she says of such daunting moments, “but there’s something that happens whenever I go and talk about this stuff. No matter how stressed out I get beforehand, something kicks in and this icy calm takes over.”
“She does not scare,” says UT School of Law professor Jack Getman, an author on labor issues and a faculty member at Yale when that university’s staff unionized. “I see in her a lot of the leadership qualities of the great labor organizers. There’s a part of her that identifies so deeply with the struggle.” He notes that Kramer seems to sense just how far and how fast to push USA, whose membership he points out is largely devoid of any experience in organized labor and until recently had been demoralized nearly to the point of hopelessness. “She has an activist’s soul,” says Getman. “She’s tough, intelligent, and deeply committed.”
This past November, Kramer raised the stakes again by hand-delivering Faulkner a list of concerns drafted by the USA board and challenging him to appear at a USA meeting to address those concerns. (On December 3, to his credit, Faulkner did so.)
Dr. Terri LeClercq, a senior lecturer at the University Law School and a member of Faculty in Support of Staff (F.I.S.St.), puts this event in perspective: “It [a UT president directly addressing staff demands] has never happened before, and it’s all because of her. Every statement Faulkner made was in response to that staff document. I’ve been here for 15 years and only with Peg’s galvanizing the staff has anything happened. Through her leadership a whole disparate group of people have come together. It’s glorious.”
For his part, President Faulkner says Kramer “is very articulate and very intelligent. Peg’s position on most things is very close to what I’m trying to achieve. We agree on probably 85%. She’s willing to stand up for what she believes in and that’s a good thing.”
Within their 15% of disagreement, however, is USA’s staunch belief that UT could end the salary inequity problem tomorrow with funds already at its discretion, while the administration claims nothing can be done unless the Legislature allocates more money in the upcoming session. On the staff side of this disagreement, feelings run very hot and very deep. Yet, as demonstrated at the December 3 meeting, Kramer’s ability to balance and channel staff discontent while ensuring that Faulkner is given a dignified hearing provides the inspiring wisdom necessary to get the job done. As with her opening statement, Kramer gets the USA position right in Faulkner’s face, but never comes close to rubbing his nose in it.
Noting her strong identification as a single mother and her lifelong love of sports, she and I agree that these traits define her leadership of USA. “I am a mom and a coach. People are, I don’t know … downtrodden. They need for someone to reach in and see the good in them and to somehow say, ‘You can do it and here’s why. It’s not as out of control as it seems.'”
What of the long odds she faces? “Having a sports background, I’m not doing this because I think we’re not going to win it. I’m not doing it for the hell of it. I’m doing this because it’s who I am. And I fully expect that we’re not going to go away.”
She does not expect, however, that if and when this struggle ends, she will return to her more lucrative private sector past of 10 years ago, when her main concern was climbing the corporate ladder. “Oh, no. I’ll never do that again. I’ll be working on behalf of women’s rights, economic rights on behalf of working people and non-working people as well, working on behalf of equity for everybody, no matter your sexual orientation or gender. Wherever I am, I’ll be working for equity and dignity.”
Rich Malley works as a local freelance writer and a UT staff member.
This article appears in December 25 • 1998 and December 25 • 1998 (Cover).