In a press conference yesterday, Living Wage Campaign members called President John T. Casteen, III's recent statements about the Living Wage Campaign a "willful misrepresentation" and "misleading at best."
Living Wage Campaign members also expressed some dissatisfaction with the administration's recent decision to raise the minimum wage of direct University employees to $9.37 per hour, reemphasizing their desire to institute a "living wage" of $10.72 per hour.
In comments published in The Cavalier Daily yesterday, Casteen said he had "never seen a computation base for the wages mentioned in local living wage publications."
Living Wage Campaign member Benjamin Van Dyne said that members have been denied meetings with the administration on multiple occasions, including when they tried to schedule a meeting yesterday.
"We have done everything in our power to educate the community," Van Dyne said, "[Casteen] was repeatedly given the information he said he never got."
University spokesperson Carol Wood explained that Casteen's statement was misinterpreted.
"He acknowledges that he had received what [a campaign member] had sent, but he didn't think it was sufficient," Wood said. "His reading of it was he's never seen [a computation base] that actually makes the case."
Wood said Casteen e-mailed the Living Wage Campaign member explaining his confusion and clarifying it.
President Casteen released a statement to the University community March 7 in which he announced that the minimum wage for direct University employees would be raised to $9.37 per hour in addition to the $3.29 per hour cost for "fringe benefits" such as health insurance and retirement benefits, for a total minimum compensation of $12.66.
Living Wage Campaign members remain unconvinced that this pay increase is adequate.
"It should be known that we students, the workers we are in dialogue with and our allies in the community will not be silenced or satisfied with half-measures," Van Dyne said.
Living Wage Campaign member Carmen Dee Comsti added that while fringe benefits are useful to many, they cannot be offered in place of higher wages.
"We argue that benefits, while important, are not a substitute for higher wages," Comsti said. "They cannot be used at the grocery store."
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