UAEA stands for United Arizona Employee Association. It is an employee association representing 800 members of the City of Tempe in contract negotiations, disciplinary actions, and selection of benefits.

An employee association is effectively a union. Our primary purpose is to negotiate a fair contract for employees that guarantees certain wages and benefits and then hold the City accountable to deliver upon those guarantees. That said, some experts argue that there is a difference - employee associations frequently represent public sector employees and these rarely have the same labor protections as private-sector employees, in Arizona especially. This may be a distinction without a difference though - while our overall tactics may differ from private sector unions, our purpose is ultimately the same.

Yes. UAEA is one of 4 employee associations in the City of Tempe. “Sworn” police officers (members of Tempe PD who carry firearms/badges and have arrest power) are represented by TOA, the Tempe Officer’s Association. Members of the fire department (who are not office staff) are represented by Local 493, which also represents Fire employees in Phoenix and Chandler. Supervisory employees are represented by TSA, Tempe Supervisor’s Association. There also are employees who work in HR and City Hall who hold “classified” jobs - they do not have a formal group representing them but can send a representative to weigh-in on proposed City changes.

There’s not an easy way to accurately answer that. The short answer is that we represent all non-supervisory employees…but that statement comes with some qualifications. For reference, you can identify these jobs by them having “NSU” in their job description. But we don’t represent employees who are classified employees and we don’t represent employees who are sworn police officers and we don’t represent fire fighters. But we do represent members of the Fire Department who are office staff and we do represent “non-sworn” members of the Police Department like Court Services staff, Forensics Specialists, and Detention Officers. So while we are not a Police union, we do represent the Police department and while we’re not a Fire union we do represent the Fire department. It also gets a little murky when one digs into job responsibilities - there are UAEA employees who supervise employees and TSA employees who supervise no one. The lines are a little arbitrary and probably made more sense when the group were initially divided - a longterm project after the JDQ is complete is re-evaluating whether jobs are appropriately categorized. Again, if you’re ever confused just check if a job description is marked as “NSU.”

Yes. The 5 employee groups (UAEA, TSA, TOA, Fire, Classified employees) and HR meet on a quarterly basis in a group called the 6-Sided Partnership. This group discusses changes to the City that impact at least 2 of the groups, things like how overtime pay is calculated or how the healthcare points system could be improved. Any group may bring business to the group but frequently these conversations are led by HR. They will often discuss things like changes in state or federal labor law and how it will impact City operations.

Yes. The employee groups do not always get everything we want but we frequently find that topics we bring up manifest in some form within the next few years. We also can play a direct role in how the City approaches things like the Segal Market study. The employee groups expressed some concerns about the original cities that were selected by Segal in the JDQ and proposed including some additional cities that they felt were more comparable in terms of size and population. We also proposed adding Maricopa County as a comparable employer since a decent number of Tempe employees leave for roles with them. This feedback was incorporated and Segal ended up analyzing 11 different employers in the JDQ study, which we feel will be a far better representation of alternative employers in the area.

UAEA currently has about 320 members. This is up significantly from 240, which was our member count about 2 years ago. We are still seeing consistent growth every month but it's been balanced in the last 6 months with a lot of retirements/resignations and members promoting to TSA positions. The UAEA board really likes when UAEA members are promoted to TSA - it usually means that the supervisor already has a grasp of union policy and will understand or empathize with our perspective if we need to discuss workplace issues.

Arizona is a right-to-work state. This means employee associations and unions cannot compel employees to join a union even if the negotiated benefits directly help non-members. To counterbalance this, UAEA has a number of member-exclusive perks like our legal services, our Employee of our Quarter program, our member meetings, and our annual scholarship. We hope the value of the work we do can continue to bring in new members - the greater the share of City employees that we represent, the harder it is for the City to not seriously consider our requests.

A MOU is a “Memorandum of Understanding.” It is essentially a legal contract between the City of Tempe and UAEA, promising certain rights and privileges to the Tempe staff we represent. The Tempe Personnel Rules offer similar protections but many of the policies within it are suggestions and not requirements. A MOU has actual legal weight - it offers us a process for resolving potential breaches of employee rights and getting restitution if needed. You can find the most recent copy of our MOU on this page.

Different employee groups have different needs and focus on different things in negotiations. Certain employee groups also have greater negotiation power - Police and Fire, for instance, are groups that have 98-100% membership among the employees they represent. For comparison, TSA has about 33% membership and UAEA has about 40% membership. If the Tempe Officer Association’s negotiators say their employees want a particular perk, it is coming from the entire Police department - in comparison, UAEA is often asking for perks and benefits that only a percentage of the City may feel strongly about.

Yes. There is a comprehensive process for MOU modification outlined in the Tempe City Charter. This is known as the “MOU Negotiations” and it is an opportunity for UAEA to make the case to Tempe HR and Management that certain changes to pay, cost-of-living adjustments, employee rights, and benefits are needed. While we rarely get everything we want, this is an opportunity to highlight employee priorities - we often find that the City tries to create new initiatives down the road after we discuss them in a formal negotiation.

We would love the ability to open the MOU whenever we want to, but our contract language (and the City Charter) specifies that it can only be reopened between September and November of each year. Even then, certain topics like pay are locked in every 5 years so the City can properly budget longterm. UAEA might be able to secure shorter negotiation terms in the future but the likeliest scenario is that we might not be able to secure as high of an annual COLA or couldn’t guarantee it for our members past a year. We’re not opposed to changing the existing process, but we would need a good reason to disrupt what, until now, has been a process with guaranteed outcomes.

A Grievance is a formal accusation by an employee or an employee association that there has been some violation of employee rights by a supervisor, manager, department, or HR. These violations may be of state or federal law, the City's Personnel Rules, or the MOUs of different employee associations. Individual employees may file Grievances by themselves but UAEA members can get the assistance of both our board and our attorney to write Grievances.

It depends. In the last few years UAEA has averaged between 6 and 10 Grievances per year. We usually reserve Grievances for serious cases - a Grievance is a specialized tool and should be utilized only when necessary. Most violations of policy are not malicious and don’t need to be addressed with Grievances. The vast majority of contract violations are mistakes or misunderstandings of the contract language and can be addressed with a simple conversation. Using Grievances to address these would both prolong the time it takes to resolve the issue and unnecessarily harm our working relationships. That said, we’re more than happy to use Grievances if there is a longterm issue we’ve been unable to resolve through normal means or if there appears to be a contract violation that needs to be immediately resolved.

UAEA is a registered 501c5, a not-for-profit organization. We are managed by an 11-person board who are elected to two-year terms. Elections are staggered, with approximately half of the board being elected each year - this means that the board will always have experienced people serving. Each member of the board has equal voting power for major decisions like setting the annual budget or deciding how to use our resources. There are 7 main roles with specific roles and 4 Citywide Representative positions (effectively union stewards) whose main job is to help members with disciplinary issues.

The President runs the organization. Per the bylaws, they lead all meetings, sign contracts and legal documents for the organization, serve as chief negotiator for the MOU process, represent the organization in meetings with the City Manager, City Departments and outside entities, and make recommendations to the board regarding the strategic direction of the organization.

The Vice President is essentially the backup for the President, but their role is not full-time release. They must know the same things the President does and be ready to assume the role of President if the President retires, steps down, or is otherwise removed before the formal end of their term. I currently meet with the VP at least once a week to coordinate UAEA’s work and ensure we’re not falling behind on any projects. Our current Vice President is Leah Sergeant. This position will be open in the 2025 elections.

The Resolutions Director is responsible for tracking and reporting on the resolutions that UAEA is currently working on. This is a lot more work than it initially sounds - UAEA can sometimes have dozens of issues open simultaneously and it’s up to the Resolutions Director to make sure we haven’t left any concerns by the wayside. That said, we do our best to keep the Resolutions Director from getting involved with the details of any particular case - that’s the job of the President or the Citywide Representatives. The Resolutions Director also identifies workplace concerns and shares them with the Executive Board. Our current Resolutions Director is Natalya Ennels. This position will be open in the 2025 elections.

The Communicators Director is responsible for ensuring effective communication between the Executive Board and the Members. They are responsible for maintaining the UAEA website and preparing the quarterly newsletter. They may have additional responsibilities as needed - currently, one of their jobs is preparing all physical documents that go up on city bulletin boards. Our current Communicators Director is Kelly Taylor.

The Membership Director is responsible for growing UAEA’s membership. They handle all new member applications, send new members a welcome packet, and represent the organization at new employee orientation. Our current Membership Director is Brittainy Nelson. This position will be open in the 2025 elections.

The Treasurer keeps track of the UAEA budget, files monthly and quarterly corporate reports, and is responsible for our end-of-year tax filing. They are responsible for proposing a new budget at the end of each fiscal year and should deliver updates to the board if we are significantly ahead or behind our proposed annual budget. This is the only position on the board that the bylaws does not require to be a City of Tempe employee - due to the complexity of our accounting (and potential dangers of improper filings) we’ve considered hiring an outside accountant to fill this role in the past. The current UAEA Treasurer is Brian Gonzales. Per our bylaws, he has the position until he decides he would like to leave - at that point the board will look for someone else.

The Secretary is UAEA’s record-keeper, maintaining notes of our board and member meetings, lists of current members,  and any other documentation that is deemed necessary. Though it doesn’t come up too often. The Secretary is also responsible for reviewing all bylaws proposals that come before the board. The current UAEA Secretary is Lisa Johnson.

A citywide rep is essentially a union steward. They are responsible for day-to-day organizing in the workplace, essentially meaning they help address issues in their work areas or related work areas prior to them escalating. Representatives also need to sit in with members receiving discipline and guide them through the Part 1/Part 2/Part 3 process.  Our current Citywide Representatives are Jeremy Hopf, Annette Betancourt, and Olivia Calderon, with one seat open. Two of these positions (Jeremy’s and the open seat) will be open in the 2025 elections.

Board members may be called to sit on interview panels and represent UAEA - this ensures a fair process and gives us an opportunity to ensure the candidates moving forward are the most highly qualified or proficient. Several Board members review scholarship essays each year - we try to get as many to participate as possible to ensure fairness. Board members may also need to review internal documents, weigh in and assist on short term projects, and help with setup/breakdown of union events.

If you’re receiving this email you’re already part of the union  - this is more of an answer for your coworkers. At the highest level, I’m part of UAEA because I think labor unions are important - yes, there are perks, but I think it’s a good way to support organized labor and help rebuild the middle class. UAEA negotiates a contract on behalf of all 800 employees we represent - that said, every other perk the union offers is not available to non-members. If you’re not a member and you want help with a supervisor’s behavior? We’re not going to help. If you’re not a member and you want help approaching HR about a pay issue? We’re not going to help. Are you not a member and you just received notice of an upcoming discipline? We’re not going to help. Important note on the last part - UAEA used to accept applications from non-members who wanted to join when they started facing disciplinary action. We no longer do that - we don’t want to be a “get-out-of-jail-free” card for non-members and think it’s unfair to longtime members to provide the same services to people who just joined.