Twenty Dartmouth Dining Services employees are losing their jobs so students can avoid paying a mandatory $800 per term minimum on food.
In an April referendum, the majority of students said they would rather give up some dining options than spend a mandatory $800 minimum. The result: Students were given a more flexible meal plan, and DDS cut 20 jobs. Eleven union workers, five non-union workers and four managers will not be re-hired after September.
"It's not easy to tell employees that right now they are on the list that doesn't get jobs for the fall," Acting DDS Director Tucker Rossiter said. "Everyone that we let go is a good worker. They happen to be victims of some circumstances."
DDS has lost more than $1 million since 1994, when then-Director Pete Napolitano instituted a meal plan that made it easier for students to eat off campus.
The cuts represent a 25 percent reduction in management, a15 percent reduction in non-union service and a 14 percent reduction in union service. Labor remains DDS's top cost.
Earl Sweet, the president of the local union that represents many DDS workers, told The Dartmouth in a previous interview that students would fail to see the broader significance of their complaints.
"Some students looked at it as an $800 thing," he said. "It's a lot more devastating than that."
Some students who depend on their DDS jobs for tuition money may also be affected: the new, streamlined DDS will offer them fewer hours of work than last year.
