Free New Mexican: NMSU employees favor union
New Mexico State University employees have voted to join a union.
Unofficial results from a mail-in election that began May 4 showed 559 of the university’s nonexempt employees voted in favor of representation by the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, or AFSCME. Some 302 workers opposed unionization.
The school’s labor relations board did not count 25 challenged ballots; 37 other ballots were ruled invalid because the instructions were not followed.
Some 1,290 nonexempt employees at the main campus, NMSU extension offices and branch campuses were eligible to vote. The results were counted and verified over a seven-hour period Wednesday.
The election will be certified on June 8 to allow five working days for any objections to be filed.
“I am so happy,” said Genevieve Bauer, a library specialist who sat through the vote count with about 60 other union supporters. “It has been a lot of work.”
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