Takeaway: Click here to email State Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin to ask him to schedule a final vote on legislation (A4164) to fix the state’s inflated fringe rate that costs us grants, harms graduate education, and threatens research and employment at Rutgers. Then call the Speaker’s office at (732) 855-7441 to make the same request.
Dear colleague,
The New Jersey State Assembly has less than a week to pass legislation our unions helped craft to fix the state’s inflated fringe rate before their term ends. We need your help to make sure Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin schedules a final vote on this bill—the last legislative step needed to permanently end this threat to research at Rutgers and other New Jersey public colleges and universities. Click here to send an email to Speaker Coughlin urging him to schedule the vote on Assembly Bill 4164—then call his office at (732) 855-7441 to make the same request.
After years of our unions’ efforts, this bill passed the full State Senate, two Senate Committees, and two Assembly Committees—by unanimous or nearly unanimous bipartisan margins each time. A final full Assembly vote on the legislation was scheduled last summer, but ultimately put off. This is the last vote we need to stop the inflated fringe rate from negatively impacting research at Rutgers and threatening the employment of thousands of us every year.
If you need a refresher on why this issue is so important to all of us: The fringe benefit rate is money that comes off the top of every grant that comes into Rutgers, to pay for state benefits like health insurance and retirement benefits (some of which our researchers don’t even get!). The fringe rate in New Jersey is more than double or even triple what researchers at institutions in other states pay. If this problem isn’t fixed permanently, we’ll lose out on more grants, and talented young researchers will study and begin their careers elsewhere.
We need this legislation to fix the fringe rate to pass before the legislature’s term ends—or we’ll have to start over with a new bill. We need the Assembly to act and get this legislation on the Governor’s desk by Monday! Click here to send an email to Speaker Coughlin urging him to support a final vote on the fringe legislation (A4164)—and then call his office at (732) 855-7441 to make the same request.
In solidarity,
Rutgers AAUP-AFT and AAUP-BHSNJ
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