President Sullivan:
It has come to our attention that several important contracts between U.Va. and service vendors are up for renegotiation in the coming months, with the first deadline as soon as May 9th. We request that the University take steps to edit these contracts so that wage and benefit information can be shared with the public. The citizens of Charlottesville have a vested interest in maintaining transparency and openness in all business dealings in the municipality. As the largest employer in the area, the University has a responsibility to uphold standards of honesty and candidness in its contracts.
The largest contractor at the University, ARAMARK, already has a stipulation in its agreement that states “ARAMARK will exchange with the University annually information which describes the compensation and benefits offered by ARAMARK to its employees located at the University of Virginia.” We urge you to include a similar clause in the contracts up for renegotiation in the next few months, including: Apache Security, on May 9th, Zatar Cleaning on July 30th, Universal Cleaners on August 5th, and Turner’s Cleaning on August 11th, and all other contracts up for renegotiation this year.
We are aware that the Living Wage Campaign has called for action on this request by May 5th and we too ask that you take action by this deadline. Issues of just compensation and the decent treatment of workers are major concerns of the Charlottesville community and we think that increased transparency with vendors would be a major step in this direction. We await your response.
Sincerely,
Charlottesville Center for Peace and Justice
Albemarle/Charlottesville NAACP
Wayside Center for Popular Education
Cville Worker Action Network
Richmond IWW
SP-CVA
