2026 Contract Ratification

It’s almost time to vote! Higher Education and General Government contract ratification vote will take place September 18-27th via electronic vote. You can also come to WPEA Headquarters at 140 Percival St NW Olympia, WA 98502 Monday – Thursday 8-5. We’ll also have more in-person voting opportunities available, with dates, times, and locations coming soon.

Current In-Person Times

Wednesday, September 23rd
7:30am-6:30pm
Olympic College
deb@wpea.org

Tuesday, September 22nd
12:00-1:00
Tumwater DNR

Thursday, September 24th
12:00-1:00
Tumwater DNR

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Below are the tentative agreements to the Higher Education & General Government contracts. Legislative tentative agreements will be made available when bargaining is complete.

Higher Education Tentative Agreement

After a long summer of bargaining, our team is presenting you the tentative agreement reached for our 2027 – 2029 collective bargaining agreement. The bargaining team fought hard until the very end to improve the working conditions at each of your colleges.

At the start of this year’s bargaining window, the team brought a variety of proposals based on member survey feedback: a 32 hour workweek during summer quarter, advance notice of two quarter’s when there’s a change to remote work, monetary enhancements when working in hazardous environments, and several longevity incentives. We had also hoped for a modest COLA given the current economic reality, but at least one that would keep pace with inflation. Sadly, the governor’s office and OFM essentially rejected all economic proposals for all of labor across the state. For the contract period, there will be no cost of living adjustment or any job specific salary adjustments.

Although angry and heartbroken by this decision from the governor’s office, the team pressed on and fought hard for every non-economic enhancement we could get, pressing the state for additional bargaining time beyond our scheduled sessions. We were not able to secure all of what we had hoped for, but the state did hear our team on several items which they included in their final offer.

Below you will find a summary of changes that highlights each change in the tentative agreement.

2027 – 2029 Higher Ed Tentative Agreement Summary Download

Higher Education Ratification Q&A Sessions

Thursday, September 24, 2026

11am to 1pm
https://wpea-org.zoom.us/j/89868991760

AND

5pm to 7pm
https://wpea-org.zoom.us/j/87093256951

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General Government Tentative Agreement

We knew going into this round of negotiations that this would be a difficult bargaining cycle, and it was.

On September 11, WPEA reached a tentative agreement with the State for our General Government contract. We will be sending that agreement to you for a ratification vote, and our bargaining team has made the decision to remain neutral on ratification. Our job is to make sure you understand exactly what is in the agreement, what we were able to accomplish, what we were not able to accomplish, and what the consequences of either decision may be. The decision about whether this agreement is good enough belongs to you.

There are some meaningful wins in this agreement. We finally resolved the R&R Day issue for our DNR members who work wildfire, requiring DNR to pay for all R&R days regardless of when they occur. We preserved the lump-sum payment for certificated employees at the Washington State School for the Blind and the Center for Deaf and Hard of Hearing Youth after the State initially proposed taking it away. We also secured seniority-based transfer rights and an additional personal leave day in each year of the agreement.

We also want to be straightforward about what we did not accomplish. There is no general wage increase in the first year of this agreement. Instead, there is a wage reopener for the second year. For a workforce that has already been losing purchasing power for more than two decades, that is deeply disappointing.

Throughout this bargaining cycle, we proposed meaningful improvements to working conditions that would not have required significant new State spending. We did that intentionally. If the State did not have money for wages, we believed there should at least be an opportunity to make meaningful improvements in other areas. Too often, the answer was still no.

I also want to take a moment to recognize the people who did this work. WPEA’s bargaining team worked incredibly hard throughout this bargaining cycle. They came to the table, pushed for meaningful improvements to working conditions, and did everything they could to secure some sort of wage increase so our members would not continue falling further behind.

That commitment continued right through the end. On our final scheduled bargaining day, team members made themselves available until 8:00 p.m. because we were still discussing the R&R day language. Throughout this cycle, we also had members attend bargaining as observers. They listened to what happened at the table, participated in our caucus discussions, asked questions, offered their perspectives, and supported the bargaining team throughout a very difficult round of negotiations.

I am grateful to every member who gave their time to this process. Bargaining team members take on a significant responsibility when they agree to represent their coworkers at the table, and they deserve our thanks. When you see or talk to one of your bargaining team members, please take a moment to thank them for the work they did on your behalf.

There is an important lesson in what happened this year. A bargaining team can work incredibly hard, bring data, make good proposals, explain the recruitment and retention crisis, and demonstrate the long-term cost of vacancies, turnover, and contracting out work. All of those things matter, but ultimately, bargaining leverage comes from the Employer believing that employees are organized and prepared to act collectively when they are not being treated fairly.

That is also why I want members to think carefully about the ratification vote. Voting no is absolutely your right, and rejecting this agreement would send a clear message to the Governor and the State that employees believe this agreement is unacceptable. A no vote, however, does not by itself create bargaining leverage or guarantee a better agreement. If employees are prepared to reject an agreement, we also need to be asking what we are prepared to do together to change the outcome.

We didn’t arrive here in one bargaining cycle. State employee salaries have been losing ground for more than two decades, and we are not going to reverse that trend in a single contract, but that does not mean we have to accept it.

Building the power to change this starts long before we sit down at the bargaining table. We need to make the salary issue a regular topic of conversation in our workplaces and stop treating two decades of declining purchasing power as though it is normal or acceptable.

Workers have the right to talk with their coworkers about their wages and working conditions, and we need to use that right. Talk to your coworkers about what has happened to state employee salaries, what another year without a wage increase means for you and your family, and whether the State can recruit and retain qualified employees at these wages. We need to start calling attention to the problem instead of quietly accepting it.

We also know that many members believe our contract contains a no-strike clause. The actual language says, “Nothing in this Agreement permits or grants to any employee the right to strike or refuse to perform their official duties.” WPEA proposed removing this language because the law already governs this issue and because members understandably read this language as saying they cannot strike. The State refused to remove it. In fact, they asserted that even our proposal to remove that article from the contract was somehow an “illegal subject” of bargaining. The language in the contract does not say that employees cannot strike; it says that the contract does not grant that right. If you want to better understand your rights around strikes and other forms of collective action, come to a UNITY meeting or a meeting of your local bargaining unit so we can talk about it. If your bargaining unit hasn’t had a meeting lately, contact your leadership team and ask them to schedule one.

Please also talk to the coworkers in your bargaining unit who aren’t members of WPEA and ask them to join. Explain why it matters. Every person we organize makes us stronger, and if we want to make meaningful progress on salaries, we need more of the people we represent actively participating in their union.

For coworkers who aren’t familiar with WPEA or aren’t sure where to start, invite them to attend one of our UNITY meetings on Wednesday. It is an easy first step toward learning more about the union, what is happening in our workplaces, and how they can get involved. We also need to make sure we have current personal email addresses and contact information for everyone we represent so that workers know about collective action, education, and other opportunities to participate.

We cannot expect a handful of bargaining team members to create the leverage we need at the bargaining table. We have to build that together in our workplaces, and the work for the next round needs to begin now.

WPEA members have already asked me to reach out to other unions and begin building a coordinated contract campaign, and we intend to do that. With a wage reopener in this tentative agreement, we will be back at the bargaining table in a year. That gives us twelve months to organize, educate, build participation, work with other unions, and have serious conversations about the collective action necessary to create leverage at the bargaining table.

All of this will require member participation, which starts with making sure you vote on this agreement. If you are represented by WPEA but are not currently a member, join so that you can participate in that decision. Whatever decision you make on ratification, please vote, and after the vote is over, stay involved.

The question isn’t only whether this contract is good enough. We also need to be asking ourselves what we are willing to do together to make sure we aren’t having this same conversation the next time we bargain.

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