By Antoinette Luzano
Daily 49er, Cal State-Long Beach

(UWire)--Cal State Long Beach will be closed an additional six days during the upcoming academic year as part of a furlough plan for all university staff and faculty.

Furloughs are unpaid and require employees to abstain from doing any type of work, including taking phone calls and checking e-mails

During the "staff and faculty shutdown days," most campus services will be closed. The dates are Sept. 8, Oct. 9, Nov. 2, March 26, April 21 and May 6.

Another 11 days outside of the school year have been classified as staff shutdown days, in which departments will be expected to close. The individual employee and their supervisor will submit a request for approval of their remaining furlough days.

Faculty will take 18 furlough days, while other employees will take 24 from August to June. Part-time employees' number of furlough days will be determined by their hours.

Furloughs are unpaid and require employees to abstain from doing any type of work, including taking phone calls and checking e-mails, according to the employee furlough day election form from Staff Human Resources.

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The furloughs will apply to all employees outside of those represented by the Statewide University Police Association, as well as those in the State Employees Trade Council, which decided against furloughs.

The union represents 1,200 maintenance employees, with about 56 at CSULB, according to George Redden, chief steward at CSULB. He said that they chose "to take our chances with layoffs" and that there was no guarantee they could prevent layoffs through furloughs.

"We tried to get them to put that in writing," Redden said.

He said that the union is currently at an impasse and has a fact-finding panel with the California State University system to resolve differences in their contract. He added that a strike - called "informational pickets," which would take place before and after work, and during lunches - is possible if no agreement on their contract is reached.

"We just want to make a point that, you know, we're out here," Redden said. "We are dedicated to this university ... so it's not a matter of loyalty or disloyalty."