Low-wage staff members and student workers at the State University of New York will receive a much-needed increase in wages because of executive action taken today by Governor Andrew Cuomo.But thousands of staff and student workers at the City University of New York are being denied the $15 minimum wage. Meanwhile, Governor Cuomo has continued to keep per-student funding at CUNY basically flat, leaving CUNY funding 14% below 2008 levels.

“Lifting the wage floor for fast-food workers, state employees and now SUNY workers is the right thing to do. Governor Cuomo listened to the growing demand from workers, students, labor unions, faith leaders and others.But singling out CUNY’s workers on the state payroll for exclusion is a monumental failure of progressive leadership. No institution embodies the progressive, pro-worker, anti-poverty goals of the minimum wage more than CUNY. No institution does more than CUNY to overcome the income inequality that the governor decries.” said Barbara Bowen, president of the Professional Staff Congress, the union of CUNY faculty and staff.

“The decision to exclude CUNY from the wage increase is a slap in the face to the thousands of low-wage workers whose labor helps to make a college education possible for CUNY’s 500,000 students. It is part of a pattern of refusing to invest the necessary funds in CUNY: the governor continues to deny any state funding for pay increases for CUNY’s academic staff, who have not had a raise in five years. Cuomo’s continuing refusal to invest in decent pay for CUNY workers is hurting the whole University.Full-time faculty are beginning to seek other jobs, and there are part-time faculty on food stamps because their CUNY salaries are so low,” Bowen continued.