The California State University chancellor Mildred Garcia on Friday expressed a desire but little hope a strike by the California Faculty Association could be averted, and put it on union officials to re-engage at the bargaining table.

“We are committed to compensating employees fairly, but we are and must be equally committed to the long-term stability and success of the CSU, which means we must be fiscally prudent,” Garcia said.

“Let me assure you, as a new chancellor four months into the job I have no interest in a strike. We are ready and willing to come back to the bargaining table with the California Faculty Association, but we must work within our financial realities. I am still hopeful for the sake of our students, faculty, staff, system and the state that we hear from our union over the weekend so we can return to the table and do everything we can to reach an agreement.”

The CFA, which represents about 29,000 professors, lecturers, librarians, counselors and athletics coaches, has been seeking a 12% pay increase. It has scheduled a five-day strike across the 23 CSU campuses starting on Monday.

The union did not have an immediate response to Garcia and CSU leadership. But in a statement Thursday, CFA vice president Chris Cox said, “In recent news reports, CSU management has only addressed our conflict over salary; they have completely ignored the issues of workload, health and safety concerns, and parental leave. Management wouldn’t even consider our proposals for appropriate class sizes, proper lactation spaces for nursing parents, gender inclusive bathroom spaces, and a clear delineation of our rights when interacting with campus authorities.

“CSU management wants to maintain the status quo, which is not working for the vast majority of our faculty, students, and staff. In order for us to have a properly functioning system in years to come, we need to improve the working conditions for faculty and learning conditions for students. This includes raising the salary floor for the lowest paid faculty; a general salary increase for all faculty; parental leave appropriate to our work assignment, and appropriate staffing for mental health counselors on campus.”

The CSU on Jan. 9 implemented a 5% general pay increase for CFA members while ending contract talks. The 5% increase is consistent, CSU officials said, with three-year agreements it reached with five other unions within the largest public university system in the country.

The union also is seeking an increase for its lowest paid faculty, more manageable workloads that would allow for increased support and engagement with students, more counselors to improve students’ access to mental health services and an expanded paid parental leave.

The CSU has restarted negotiations with Teamsters 2010, which represents CSU administrative, clerical and skilled trades workers. The Teamsters are to strike in coalition with the CFA at what for some CSU campuses marks the start of the spring semester. Fresno State had its first day of instruction on Thursday.

The CSU through eight months of negotiations has maintained that a 12% pay increase is not sustainable – it has proposed a 15% salary increase in 5% raises over the next three years – and attempted to counter what it called ‘misinformation’ that it could dip into $2.5 billion in reserve funds.

“Most of the CSUs reserves are committed to specific, necessary and critical campus obligations,” Leora Freedman, the CSUs vice chancellor for human resources, said in a zoom meeting. “The CSUs other reserves that are not committed to those specific, necessary and critical campus obligations are needed for times of economic uncertainty or emergencies. We have about $766 million in emergency reserves.

“These emergency reserves could keep our campuses in operation for about 30 days. That is far below the university’s board policy and national best practices on reserves, which is that a university should have enough funds to cover at least three to six months of operations. One-time funds such as reserves cannot be used for on-going recurring expenses like salaries. Any statement that it would be appropriate or responsible for the CSU to use reserves of any kind to pay salaries is another example of misinformation.”

All CSU campuses, its officials reiterated, will remain open during the strike.

“We have provided and will continue to provide students and families with guidance and timely updates so they’re able to check on the status of their classes,” Garcia said.