(The AFL-CIO issued the following on November 17.)
New members reported in this week’s WIP: 1,158
New members reported in WIP, year to date: 130,553
UNITING UP NORTH–In early November, 460 manufacturing workers in Quebec, Canada, chose a voice at work with UNITE. In Granby, 230 workers at auto parts manufacturer LaGran voted for UNITE’s Quebec Joint Board. In Montreal, 130 workers at Universal Linen chose the Montreal Joint Board. Some 100 workers at Bois Franc Wickham, which produces wood flooring near Drummondville, selected the Quebec board.
A POWERFUL VOICE–A nearly unanimous majority of 374 members of the Water and Power Authority Employees’ Association in St. Thomas, St. Croix and St. John, U.S. Virgin Islands, voted to affiliate with the Utility Workers Nov. 3. The union members work in the electric and water industries. The majority of 49 production and maintenance employees of Orion Power Operating Services/Reliant Energy in Niles, Ohio, voted Nov. 5 to join UWUA.
PLANTING UNION SEEDS–In the Chicago area, 106 workers at Acres Landscaping Group won a voice on the job this month with the Teamsters and Operating Engineers. The two unions have joined together in a campaign to bring justice to workers in the Chicago area landscaping industry. Half the workers at Acres are part of IBT Local 703 and the other half are with IUOE Local 150.
WHAT A VIEW–With no dissenting votes, the majority of 105 nursing home workers at the Manhattan View Nursing Home in Union City, N.J., voted Nov. 6 to join SEIU Local 1199NJ for a voice at work.
CROSSING WITH PRIDE–The 44 members of the Crossing Guards of North Brunswick, N.J., a municipal employees association, voted recently to affiliate with the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union Local 108, an affiliate of the United Food and Commercial Workers.
CLEANING UP–Twenty custodians, whose jobs at University of California, San Francisco were contracted out last May, celebrated their return to full pay and benefits as members of AFSCME Local 3299 Nov. 1 after a high-profile struggle. Workers and their supporters in the community held weekly pickets. The privateers had cut the custodians’ pay, eliminated their pensions and reduced health care and other benefits.
MIAMI BOUND–Tens of thousands of working family members from throughout the hemisphere will travel to Miami Nov. 18-21 to call for fair trade and to stop President George W. Bush’s Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) agreement. If approved, FTAA would multiply the job loss, lower wages and weaker labor and environmental protections produced by the North American Free Trade Agreement. In rallies, workers’ forums and teach-ins, union, environmental and human rights activists will support workers’ rights and trade that benefits everyone. The events coincide with the Miami meeting of trade ministers from every nation in the hemisphere except Cuba to discuss the next steps in creating the FTAA. For more information, visit http://www.aflcio.org/stopftaa . And check http://www.aflcio.org for daily news updates on FTAA events.
DOWN TO WIRE ON MEDICARE, O.T.–This week may be the last opportunity to prevent the privatization of Medicare and to stop the Bush administration’s overtime pay take-away proposal that could end overtime pay for as many as 8 million workers. With Congress rushing towards a pre-Thanksgiving adjournment, Republican leaders in Congress plan to push for a vote this week on a conference report that would jeopardize Medicare benefits for millions of seniors and set the stage for privatizing the program. This proposal “would undermine the Medicare program upon which 41 million beneficiaries depend,” AFL-CIO President John Sweeney said. “The risk of benefit cuts is far too high a price to pay for the inadequate, unreliable prescription drug benefit contained in the legislation. This is a bad deal for seniors. If presented in its present form, Congress should reject it.” For more information on the fight to save Medicare, visit http://www.aflcio.org or http://www.retiredamericans.org . On the overtime front, back-room maneuvering by the Bush administration and House Republican leaders has made it increasingly likely that the overtime pay protections approved by both the Senate and House will not make it out of Congress this year. Bush’s Labor Department could put the overtime pay cuts into effect as soon as January. President Bush has threatened to veto the fiscal year 2004 Labor, Health and Human Services and Education appropriations bill because of the overtime guarantee.
EMPLOYEE FREE CHOICE ACT ANNOUNCED–Surrounded by workers struggling to form unions in their workplaces, Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.) on Nov. 13 announced they will introduce the Employee Free Choice Act. The legislation, which also is backed by Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.), would make common-sense improvements to U.S. labor law, allowing employees to freely choose whether to form unions by signing cards authorizing union representation. It also would provide mediation and arbitration for first-contract disputes and establish stronger penalties for violation of employee rights when workers seek to form a union and during first contract negotiations. “Behind the doors of the workplaces of America, workers face incredible–often ruthless–opposition when they try to come together in a union,” said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney at a Capitol Hill news conference. “Our nation’s workers want to form unions today, and this legislation puts them on the road to making sure they get that chance.” Wade Henderson, executive director of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, said, “The freedom to form a union is a fundamental civil right. We must put an end to employer abuses as a matter of civil and human rights.” Call your U.S. senators at 202-224-3121 and U.S. representative at 202-225-3121 this week and urge them to co-sponsor the Employee Free Choice Act. For more information, visit http://www.aflcio.org/aboutunions/voiceatwork/efca.cfm .
KEEP THE TARIFFS–The World Trade Organization ruling Nov. 10 that steel safeguard tariffs enacted in 2002 are illegal confronts President Bush with a choice, Steelworkers President Leo Gerard said. “Will he exercise his sovereign right as president to protect the jobs and survival of the entire American steel industry, or will he knuckle under to the threat of economic blackmail?” Bush imposed the three-year tariffs to protect the steel industry from surging imports of cheap, subsidized steel that was being dumped on the U.S. market. Since 1998, 42 steel companies have declared bankruptcy and more than 50,000 steelworkers have lost their jobs.
GOOD NEWS, BAD NEWS–Federal workers won one battle with the Bush administration but lost another last week. Bush’s drive to privatize the federal government by changing the rules that govern contracting out federal jobs and services to Big Business–OMB Circular A-76–hit a roadblock when those changes were modified by congressional negotiators for the Transportation and Treasury department appropriations bill. AFGE President John Gage said those changes will allow federal workers to compete more fairly with private companies to maintain the federal work. But Gage slammed Congress for approving a Defense authorization bill that allows Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld to decide whether the 700,000 Defense Department workers have collective bargaining rights, the right to join a union, due process and appeal rights.
GROCERY TALKS SHELVED–Federal mediators suspended negotiations between striking UFCW members and three major California supermarket chains on Nov. 12. The talks had resumed Nov. 10 after a month-long stalemate. More than 70,000 UFCW members in California and another 10,000 in Kentucky, Ohio and West Virginia are on strike or are locked out. The workers are taking a stand to protect their health care benefits. Watch your mail and e-mail to find out how to thank these workers for their stand on health care as Thanksgiving approaches.
DEC. 10 DAY OF ACTION NEARS–Activists around the nation are busy planning creative, attention-grabbing events to commemorate International Human Rights Day, Dec. 10, and rev up the union movement’s campaign to restore every worker’s freedom to form a union. In Boston, activists plan to rally at the state capitol and march to the National Labor Relations Board regional office. Rep. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) will serve on a Workers Rights Board to hear about the obstacles facing workers trying to form unions in Cleveland. Los Angeles activists will rally at several locations where employers are thwarting workers’ wishes to join unions and then converge at a huge rally in downtown’s Pershing Square. To add your union’s event to an online calendar, visit http://www.aflcio.org/aboutunions/voiceatwork/calendar.cfm . For more information, e-mail dfenwick@aflcio.org.
‘TELL US THE TRUTH’–Activist musicians Billy Bragg, Tom Morello and Lester Chambers (of the Chambers Brothers), along with Steve Earle, Jill Sobule and Boots Riley are using their music to raise awareness on current trade and media reform issues. Their 14-city “Tell Us The Truth” tour is sponsored by the AFL-CIO, Jobs with Justice, Common Cause, Citizen Trade Campaign, Free Press and the Future of Music Coalition. Concert dates include Miami on Nov. 19; New York, Nov. 22; Boston, Nov. 23; and Washington, D.C., Nov. 24-25, including a free performance at the AFL-CIO headquarters Nov. 25. For ticket information, visit http://www.tellusthetruth.org .
VIRTUAL UNION MALL–Take the sweat(shop) out of holiday shopping. If you’re tired of scouring racks of clothing looking for the union label or “Made in U.S.A.,” relax and visit The Union Mall at http://www.nosweatshop.com . The stores in this online shopping mall sell only union-made items, including clothing–your guarantee the clothes weren’t made under sweatshop conditions. Also check out the great holiday shopping at The Union Shop (http://www.aflcio.org/shop).
B(U)Y THE BOOK–The AFL-CIO’s Working for America Institute has available until Nov. 19 autographed copies of Tom Frank’s book, “One Market Under God: Extreme Capitalism, Market Populism and the End of Economic Democracy” for $15, including shipping and handling. Frank’s book declares the New Economy is a fraud and deflates the props it stands on. Send an e-mail to info@workingforamerica.org by close of business Wednesday, Nov. 19, telling WAI how many copies you want. Then send a check for that amount–made out to AFL-CIO Working for America Institute–and the shipping adresss(es) to 888 16th St., N.W., Suite 300, Washington, DC 20006.
PENNY SINGLETON DIES–Actress Penny Singleton, first woman president of the Variety Artists, died Nov. 14 in Los Angeles. As AGVA president in the 1960s, Singleton lobbied for better treatment for chorus dancers and helped end organized crime influence in the union. Singleton, 95, was best known for her role as the comic-strip character Blondie Bumstead in 28 movies from 1938-1950. She also was the voice of Jane Jetson in “The Jetsons” television cartoon series.
ORIT LEADER DIES–Luis Anderson, 62, general secretary of ORIT, the Latin American arm of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, died suddenly Nov. 15 at his office in Caracas, Venezuela. A native of Panama, Anderson served as ORIT’s top staff member for 17 years. Anderson was “completely dedicated to making life better for working people,” said AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Linda Chavez-Thompson, president of ORIT.
Work in Progress is also available on our website at http://www.aflcio.org/aboutaflcio/wip .