(The AFL-CIO distributed the following on March 8.)
New members reported in this week’s WIP: 3,425
New members reported in WIP, year to date: 27,421
FOR BETTER MENTAL HEALTH—More than 1,800 direct-care workers, counselors, nurses and administrators with Northwestern Human Services (NHS) throughout Pennsylvania voted by a wide margin Feb. 24 for a voice on the job with AFSCME. NHS is the largest provider of mental health services in the state.
CALIFORNIA WINS—SEIU welcomed 900 new members last month. Some 800 workers at two Tenet Healthcare facilities in Southern California voted for Local 399, including 500 certified nursing assistants, technologists and others at Encino-Tarzania Regional Medical Center and 300 at Los Alamitos Medical Center. Meanwhile, the 100 employees of Public Citizen, a consumer advocacy organization, voted Feb. 27 for Local 500. The employees work at offices in Washington, D.C., Texas and California.
STATE WORKERS GAIN A VOICE—A total of 725 workers voted recently to join the United Food and Commercial Workers. In Washington state, 220 employees at Bellevue Community College voted overwhelmingly for Local 365/Washington Public Employees Association (WPEA) on Jan. 30. They were joined by 51 state lottery workers who voted for WPEA Feb. 17. Other workers who chose a union with UFCW include 142 caregivers and other staff at Cardinal McCloskey Services Inc. at 13 locations in Westchester, Rockland County and Bronx, N.Y.; 104 workers at Interstate Chemical in Hermitage, Pa.; 85 workers at the Tiffany Hall Nursing Home in Port St. Lucie, Fla.; 50 nursing home workers at Wynnwood Nursing Home in West Memphis, Ark.; 35 construction assistance workers at Moca Ready Mix Inc., in Moca, Puerto Rico; 30 highway and park department workers in Foxboro Township, Mass.; and eight production workers at ACS, LLC-Cooler in Yuma, Ariz.
POLITICS, ORGANIZING ON EC AGENDA—Union leaders will discuss plans to educate and mobilize working families to vote in the 2004 elections during the winter meeting of the AFL-CIO Executive Council March 9–11 in Bal Harbour, Fla. House Minority Leader Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Rep. Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.) will address the council. Federation President John Sweeney will join workers and former House Minority Whip David Bonior March 10 to discuss an unprecedented campaign to help workers exercise their freedom to choose a union. The federation is working to win passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, which would ensure employees are able to form a union without the debilitating obstacles employers routinely use to thwart their free choice.
BUSH 9/11 ADS ‘HYPOCRISY’—Fire Fighters President Harold Schaitberger condemned the use of images of firefighters in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks in President George W. Bush’s new political ads. Schaitberger called the ads “hypocrisy at its worst,” pointing out that Bush has consistently refused to provide firefighters the resources they need to help keep Americans safe. The ads were released on the first anniversary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). AFGE President John Gage called on Bush to create a fair personnel system for DHS employees. The Bush administration has proposed new rules that would strip thousands of DHS workers of their right to join a union.
NO TAX $ FOR OFFSHORE JOBS—The fight against moving jobs offshore is heating up on Capitol Hill. The Senate on March 4 passed 70–26 an amendment that would bar some federal contract work from being performed overseas. The amendment to S. 1637 was introduced by Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.), and, among other things, would stop contractors from moving government work offshore that once was done by federal employees. S. 1637, backed by the Bush administration, would expand tax breaks that encourage companies to move offshore. The AFL-CIO has called for the bill to be recrafted to give additional incentives to keep domestic manufacturing in the United States. On March 5, hundreds of union members joined Sens. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) and Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) for a Capitol Hill hearing and rally against shipping jobs overseas.
SHOW US THE JOBS—The nation’s economy generated only 21,000 net new jobs in February, and unemployment remained unchanged at 5.6 percent, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported March 5. The official unemployment number does not include 392,000 discouraged workers who gave up looking for jobs in February. The economy again lost manufacturing jobs—3,000—for the 43rd consecutive month for a total of 2.9 million manufacturing jobs lost since President Bush took office, according to BLS. The economy remains nearly 2.2 million jobs short of the more than 2.4 million new jobs the administration projected the economy would create by this time. Over the past six months, the economy has added only 364,000 jobs, which falls nearly two-thirds short of what is needed just to accommodate new workforce entrants, much less help workers who remain unemployed. A new report by the nonprofit Economic Policy Institute (www.epinet.org) released March 4 finds that long-term unemployment—when a jobless worker has looked for work six months or more—rose by 198.2 percent between 2000 and 2003. “The statistics clearly show the crisis is not being addressed and our country’s leaders are oblivious to the suffering of the unemployed,” AFL-CIO President John Sweeney said.
STRATEGIC ALLIANCE—The Steelworkers and PACE International Union agreed March 5 to form a strategic alliance in which the two unions will share knowledge, techniques and experiences, conduct joint activities in support of their members and build on their rank-and-file programs to raise a collective voice on issues facing working families, according to a joint statement. The two unions already have combined forces in some areas: PACE has launched the USWA’s Rapid Response political and education action program, and USWA is implementing PACE’s emergency response safety program. The unions intend to combine forces to mobilize union voters in political races this year.
WORKING TOGETHER—The AFL-CIO will join with the Communications Workers of America and the Electrical Workers to mount long-term strategic campaigns in support of efforts by workers seeking a union at Comcast Communications and Verizon Wireless. The employers have systematically tried to intimidate the workers, avoid negotiations and oust incumbent unions through decertification drives, the unions say. The strategic corporate campaign will include political, regulatory, public relations and shareholder actions to persuade the companies to respect workers’ rights.
MARCH MADNESS—Reporters for The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones Newswires and other Dow Jones & Co. Inc. publications picketed the company’s Washington, D.C., offices March 5 to protest company demands for health care cutbacks and a wage freeze. The workers, members of the Independent Association of Publishers’ Employees, The Newspaper Guild/CWA Local 1096, have worked without a contract since May 2003. The protest is part of a “March Madness” campaign against Dow Jones’s demands. The union says the publisher has violated the previous contract by refusing to pay overtime to reporters.
CONTRACT NULLIFYING NETWORK—Members of National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians/CWA are protesting union-busting tactics by CNN (Cable News Network). Last year, the cable news giant canceled its contract with Team Video Service, a union company, and required more than 250 employees to reapply for their jobs as direct employees of CNN. The network hired some 50 percent of the workers, resulting in the layoffs of more than 100 long-term union workers in the New York and Washington, D.C., areas, including union officers and stewards. CNN now refuses to recognize NABET/CWA as the bargaining agent for the workers it hired and instead subjects them to continuous anti-union rhetoric and captive-audience meetings, the union leaders say.
USWA GETS ASSURANCE ON TIRES—The USWA announced March 3 that Goodyear Tire agreed to manufacture a significant portion of its new Assurance tire line at union plants. Last month, the union requested information from the company over a decision to produce the tires at a nonunion plant. The move could have violated the union’s contract with Goodyear, which gives the 13 USWA-represented plants first preference in making new products developed for sale in North America.
HEALTH CARE IN ACTION—More than 225,000 retirees, union activists, students and health care reform supporters mobilized March 4 for a “Health Care Action Day” in some 125 communities in 34 states. Besides workplace rallies, activists held demonstrations and marches, forums and hearings calling attention to the crushing burden of health care debt on working families and employer pressure on workers to pay for runaway health care costs. For more information, visit www.jwj.org.
MORE WOMEN WORK FOR LESS—More women are in the global workplace than ever before, but women still are not paid the same as men for equal work, according to a new report by the International Labor Organization (ILO), an arm of the United Nations. The report, Global Employment Trends for Women 2004, was prepared for International Women’s Day, March 8. The report provides “stark picture of the status of women in the world of work today,” says ILO Director-General Juan Somavia. “Women must have an equal chance of raising to the top of the jobs ladder.” For a copy of the report, visit www.ilo.org/public/english/employment/strat/global.htm.
ON WISCONSIN—With the new Medicare drug legislation prohibiting the program from negotiating lower costs with pharmaceutical companies, Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle (D) has launched an expanded website—www.drugsavings.wi.gov—that allows citizens to purchase prescription drugs from Canadian pharmacies. You can support the Wisconsin service and join the fight for affordable prescription drugs by going to the state’s website and signing Doyle’s online petition to Congress and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration or visit www.retiredamericans.org.
PLAY FAIR AT OLYMPICS—Saying sweatshops violate the Olympic spirit, global unions launched a worldwide campaign March 4 calling on the International Olympic Committee and sportswear companies to clean up their acts. The “Play Fair at the Olympics” campaign seeks to stop the giant sportswear companies from violating the rights of millions of workers around the world to fill shops with sporting clothes and shoes in time for the Olympic Games in Athens, Greece. In a new report (www.global-unions.org/pdf/OlympicReportENG.pdf), the campaign reveals the various ways in which the sportswear industry is exploiting workers. For more information, visit www.fairolympics.org.
NEW LEADER—UFCW’s executive board unanimously elected Joe Hansen, the union’s secretary-treasurer since 1997, to fill the unexpired term of retiring president Douglas Dority. AFL-CIO President John Sweeney saluted Dority “for his years of service and leadership,” and said Hansen is “at heart a union organizer and mobilizer who will help build a stronger and more dynamic labor movement.” Hansen’s term runs through 2008. The board also elected Anthony Perrone as the new secretary-treasurer.