“Musicians of the Minnesota Orchestra on Tuesday said they had given management a counterproposal on a new contract,” writes Graydon Royce in Tuesday’s (9/10) Star Tribune (Minneapolis). “Management disagreed, calling the communication a ‘vague framework for a proposal that calls for wage increases over three years.’ … Citing a confidentiality pact agreed to by both sides, [musicians’ spokesman Blois Olson] said the union considered the offer to be a ‘financially specific’ proposal. That is significant because the musicians had never offered a counteroffer in their standoff with management…. [Orchestra president Michael] Henson said a request for a pay increase at this stage is ‘extraordinary.’ The board’s latest proposal would cut annual minimum salaries by 25 percent. Musicians voted that down last week. Regardless, both sides agree there was an exchange of information that seems to indicate the two sides are communicating. Neither side would say whether it means they are negotiating directly with each other or through former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell, who has offered to mediate…. Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak … said that the two sides need to negotiate. ‘Both sides have to stop looking for others to bail them out,’ Rybak said. ‘There have been many people who have stepped in over time, but all have reached the conclusion that this will only be solved by the two sides at a bargaining table.… We have to have dramatic change from both sides.… The constant communication through the media has built such hostility that this cannot be solved by someone from the outside,’ he said.”
Posted September 11, 2013
