28,000 New York City day care workers join Teachers Union

Biggest union campaign the city has seen since early 1960s, says union

New York's day care workers had plenty to celebrate on October 24, after voting by an huge 87-1 margin to join New York State United Teachers, which also represents city public school employees.

The two-year campaign was given a big boost in May, when Gov. Spitzer signed an executive order giving home day-care providers the right to unionize. Although Republican Mayor Bloomberg complained that union workers would be too costly, the governor's office said his aim was to improve the quality of child care.

'Not just custodians of kids'

Union president Randi Weingarten also wants to improve training for daycare workers. “I have a vision of educational unionism from birth through university,” she said, where child care providers "are not just custodians of kids, but they can play a pivotal role in teaching kids.”

The workers average less than $19,000 a year, with no health insurance or paid sick days, and have trouble getting reimbursed for food and other supplies. The majority are women of color, and many are Spanish-speaking. The Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) teamed up with the UFT to collect thousands of authorization cards from workers, which triggered the union election.

As for the state's other day care workers, the Civil Service Employees Association will be organizing in the suburbs and upstate.

Union women push for leadership roles, political change

At 2007 national CLUW convention

Taken from PAI & other sources

Union women could make the key difference in 2008 elections, if they take leadership in their unions and mobilize around issues important to working families, such as health care. That was a key message from the 2007 Coalition of Labor Union Women convention, where nearly 800 delegates met Oct. 10-13 in Las Vegas.

Unions need more diverse leadership

“To win political and organizing campaigns, we need to reach out to the diverse American workforce. But the leadership and staff of the American labor movement still do not reflect the rich diversity of our membership and our workforce.” With those words, Philadelphia CLUW President Kathy Black introduced the resolution to push hard not only for political change, but also for diversity in the labor movement.

The resolution called on CLUW “to maximize our impact on voter registration, voter education and get-out-the-vote campaigns” in next year’s election.

Marsha Zakowski

“We have to take this back down to the local level,” and really push it, said a CLUW delegate from Chicago.

"It’s predicted that women will be responsible for electing the next president of the United States,” CLUW President Marsha Zakowski of the Steel Workers declared. She reminded delegates of the strong role women played in changing the House and Senate in 2006.

Delegates, who came from across the U.S. and Canada, took on the challenge and adopted the resolution by acclamation. They pledged to aggressively pursue the goal set at their 2005 convention, to gain the same proportion of women and minorities in leadership and staff as there are in the units they represent.

Burrus calls for more women leaders

APWU Pres. Burrus with "Orange Gang" of postal worker CLUW members

Speaking strongly in favor of that effort was William Burrus, President of the American Postal Workers Union -- who was escorted into the hall by CLUW members in his delegation chanting, “Don’t mess with Bill”, from an old R&B song. Burrus agreed that "People in the workplace must see individuals that represent their interests who look like them, have the same aspirations that they have, face the same struggles that they face."

Evelyn Murphy, former Lt Governor of Massachusetts, and author of Getting Even: Why Women Don’t Get Paid Like Men and What to do About It, said that their pay gap with men can cost a woman with a law degree $2 million over her lifetime. Dr. Murphy advised delegates to benchmark salaries, conduct workshops, and make CLUW a leading national voice for equality.

April Medlin from Military Families Speak Out (MFSO) challenged CLUW sisters to get active to end the Iraq war. The convention also featured workshops on self-defense, preventing cervical cancer, and leadership/ organizing skills.

Call for union women to lead in health care

Helen Elliott, AFSCME District Council 90 President, with Linda Chavez Thompson

Among the 18 resolutions delegates approved was a call for CLUW to "make health care issues a cornerstone of its ongoing work" and actively help educate women about issues such as its Cervical Cancer Prevention Works program. In fact, health care was the top concern of women taking the AFL-CIO's 2007 ”Ask a Working Woman” survey. (More on this in the next Berger-Marks web site update.)

CLUW delegates gave a sustained standing ovation to Linda Chavez-Thompson who just retired as an AFL-CIO vice president. CLUW took no stand on presidential politics, but both Senator Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and former Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.), addressed delegates by video.

See sidebar for some insightful quotes.

Government Accountability Office votes union, 2-1!

Taken from PAI story by Mark Gruenberg

Workers at the GAO agency filed for union recognition in May

Some 1,800 analysts at the U.S. government’s top watchdog auditing agency joined the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers after an overwhelming 897-144 vote for the union on Sept. 20. The union drive, the first in GAO’s 86-year history, was spurred by a new “pay band” system imposed on them the previous year. The salary “bands” eliminated cost-of-living increases for many workers, labeled some of them as “over market,”and cut salaries.

“We’re ecstatic!,” said Jacqueline Harpp, a senior analyst. “Our slogan for this campaign was ‘band together’ and that’s exactly what we did. Over the past 18 months we came together regardless of pay band, years of service, and whether we worked in D.C. or the field. This vote reflects that spirit of unity.”

May:Analysts filed for union vote

Women no longer as happy as men

More work (while men play) takes its toll, says survey

"Men apparently enjoy being with their parents, while women find time with their mom and dad to be slightly less pleasant than doing laundry," is what a New York Times article concluded from a new survey investigating how happy we are.

That, says Princeton economist Alan Krueger, reflects the simple fact that the time women spent with their parents resembles work, while men tend "to be sitting on the sofa and watching football with their dad." In general, there's a "growing happiness gap between men and women," the Times article concluded, after reviewing current research.

While women felt slightly happier than men in the early 1970s, now men report greater happiness. While men have cut back on activities they don't like and relax more, the move into the workplace has had the opposite effect on women.

Betsey Stevenson

"Women now have a much longer to-do list than they once did (including helping their aging parents),' says the Times. "They can’t possibly get it all done." While women spend less time doing tasks like dusting, they may still be uncomfortable living in a dusty house.

University of Pennsylvania economist Betsey Stevenson co-authored one study, The Paradox of Declining Female Happiness. As she points out, the drop in female happiness doesn't necessarily mean we're worse off; it also reflects the fact that women want more out of life. Most now want to do meaningful work outside the home, while still fulfilling the traditional goals of a beautiful and well-kept home, good relationships, and well-adjusted children. With benefits like government-subsidized preschool or paid leave still hard to come by and men still not taking on a fair share of the home burden, women are stressed.

Wal-Mart taken to court for cheating workers - again

After being fined $140 million already

The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union filled an off-Broadway theater in Sept. with Walmartopia, a satire of the world’s largest corporation .

PAI Photo Service.

Wal-Mart was taken to court again in October , this time in Minnesota, for denying workers pay for overtime and breaks. In a similar class-action suit in Philadelphia, a judge added $62 million to the $78 million that 125,000 Wal-Mart workers previously won.

"As in 30 other attempted or successful class actions around the country, plaintiffs say Wal-Mart knowingly hired too few people to do too much work," reported Bloomberg news service. "To fill the gap, managers pushed hourly workers to skip a lunch here, a rest break there, and sometimes stay a few minutes after clocking out, the lawsuits claim."

The violations in Minnesota cost workers more than $27 million, attorneys said.

Students at 20 college campuses rally vs. American Eagle

Taken from PAI

In the U.S. and Canada hundreds of students spent a week--Sept.10-16--in protests and a boycott against American Eagle outfitter’s mistreatment of Ontario workers who want to unionize, UNITE HERE said.

The boycott was aimed at getting college students to stop buying the outfitter’s goods until American Eagle’s Canadian distribution contractor, National Logistics Services stops its anti-union actions. NLS workers “faced harassment and intimidation when they sought to improve conditions by forming a union,” UNITE HERE said. “American Eagle’s Code of Conduct for Contractors requires protection for freedom of Association,” it added.

NLRB: more bad news...

NLRB makes it easier to lose union

As soon as a majority sign union cards

Taken from PAI articles By Mark Gruenberg

Unions these days often side-step long, drawn out and unfair union election battles by getting employers to honor their workers' choice of a union after a majority sign union cards - a so-called "card check." But the Republican majority on the National Labor Relations Board just made it easier for non-union dissenters to cripple the new union before it's had a chance to function.

American Rights at Work keeps an eye on NLRB

Until now, regardless of whether a union was chosen by card check or election, there was a long “recognition bar” before dissenters-- often secretly aided and abetted by employers--could try to oust the union through a decertification drive. But the NLRB just shortened that bar for future card-check cases in its Sept. 29 Dana Metaldyne Corp. vs. UAW ruling.

The UAW had won an agreement from Dana that it would recognize the union wherever a majority signed cards, and the NLRB okayed such agreements two years ago.

Overturned rule had been accepted for 45 years

The Board overturned a ruling in effect since 1962 . It will now process decertification petitions filed by a minority of workers within 45 days of when the majority won the card check, so long as some conditions are met. In fact, an anti- union minority could start circulating a petition to get rid of the union even before the union is approved.

The two dissenting Democrats countered that this was disruptive of labor relations, and AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney called it “outrageous” that the board “would effectively permit a minority of employees to negate the majority's decision to have a union."

Republicans & industry groups ganged up to pressure NLRB

The powerful lobby that pressed the NLRB to change the rules and disrupt new unions included 21 Republican members of Congress and corporations in the auto, restaurant and construction industries, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and the National Association of Manufacturers.

The UAW and AFL-CIO pointed out that card checks can be more democratic than an election process that often involves negative campaigning, veiled threats, and huge delays, and where only the wishes of employees who actually vote are counted. Card check, on the other hand, requires that an absolute majority of the workers in the unit sign cards for a union to be recognized.

And some good organizing news:

Contractor welcomes union after decades of fighting

From WINS radio news service

An upstate New York contracting business that vigorously fought unionization for decades recently decided to work with unions instead.

“We had pitched battles with the unions – both legal and otherwise," admitted Oriska company boss Jim Kernon. But he decided that in conducting anti-union warfare, "You’re hurting everyone, including yourself.”

Kernon now believes greed motivates anti-union companies and that in fact unions built the middle class in America and add tremendous value and professionalism to construction trades: “The best place for us to be is to move into the area where the union is the strongest and utilize their skills and training for our benefit and move away from our non-union experience, ” he concluded.

Casino workers sign up for the UAW

Election win at Tropicana, NLRB honors Bally's vote

Caesars dealer Aneil Patel

Recent organizing wins have brought UAW membership at casinos to more than 6,000 workers In Detroit, Atlantic City, & Newport, R.I. In Atlantic City In late October, 90 percent of slot techs at the Tropicana Casino voted for union representation. The number of elections won in Atlantic City gaming properties this year now total six, including two bargaining units at Tropicana and full- and part-time dealers and other workers at Caesars, Trump Plaza and Bally’s.

. An NLRB judge dismissed election objections filed by Bally’s. It helps that workers at MotorCity Casino Hotel in Detroit recently ratified a new contract that includes 4 percent yearly raises & other gains.

NLRB tells Foxwoods Casino to clean up its act

At Foxwoods Casino, the biggest private employer in Connecticut, dealers won statements of support from many public officials for their right to a free and fair union election after a supermajority filed a petition with the NLRB.

An NLRB investigation confirmed many unfair labor practice charges filed by the union, and told the company to clean up its act or it would be cited.

Other organizing victories

First Student Transportation votes for AFSCME

By a 93%-7% margin, 400 public school bus drivers, monitors and mechanics voted to join AFSCME Council 62 at First Student Transportation in Indianapolis this August.

Reddaway agrees to card check

In the new agreement the Teamster local unions reached with USF Reddaway in California, Arizona and New Mexico, the company pledges to recognize the union in non-union locations wherever a majority of workers sign cards saying they want the union.

Go ahead & sue to retaliate against unions, NLRB tells companies

Taken from PAI and WINS articles

With a 3-2 decision on Sept. 29, the Board gave a green light to retaliatory lawsuits by businesses against unions. The Supreme Court, while admitting that such lawsuits could be "a ‘powerful instrument of coercion or retaliation," had ordered the Board to allow them.

By siding with the notorious anti-union company BE&K Construction , the Board overruled previous NLRB decisions that such lawsuits violate labor law, and said "a reasonably based lawsuit" could go ahead, regardless of the motive for behind it. While it did leave open the possibility of barring a suit that is a "mere sham, filed for harassment purposes," the Republican majority opined that "The right of access to a court is too important to be called an unfair labor practice" even if the goal is to keep "employees from exercising a protected right."

The sole Democrat agreed that the Board had to honor the Supreme Court decision, but said it went too far by legalizing virtually all retaliatory lawsuits.

Almost all nations grant women paid maternity leave

Just four don't -- guess which?

A woman worker has the legal right to take paid time off when she has a baby in 170 countries, and 98 of them offer at least 14 weeks off with pay. But not the U.S.A.

from The Work, Family and Equity Index

The U.S. stands almost alone, with only Liberia, Papau New Guinea and Swaziland as company, in not requiring employers to pay women who take maternity leaves. That fact comes from “The Work, Family and Equity Index,” a report released in 2007 by researchers at Harvard and McGill Universities. It's available online and also highlighted in the August edition of National Geographic magazine.

The only right new mothers have to take time off in the U.S. comes from the 1993 Family and Medical Leave Act, which guarantees just 12 weeks without pay, and has such broad exceptions for small businesses and new workers that as many as two out of five workers don't even qualify, reported the New York Times on October 6.

A few states have acted to correct that travesty. California has required paid family leave since 2004, and in April Washington State approved a law granting parents paid time off. New York is considering a bill to guarantee up to three months off with half pay for a family emergency.

Other NLRB highlights & lowlights

Taken from PAI and WINS articles

Company misdeeds prompt NLRB to throw out election

Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1181-1061 will get another try at unionizing Towne Bus LLC of Holtsville, N.Y., the National Labor Relations Board ruled. By a 2-1 margin, the board threw out last December’s vote because the bus firm illegally promised future benefits to workers “in order to dissuade them from voting for the union.” The benefits were part of a new employee manual distributed just before the vote.

After 5 years, Sunshine Piping told to stop breaking the law

When workers for Sunshine Piping, Inc. of Panama City, Fla. tried to unionize with Plumbers Local 366, the company threatened to close shop if workers voted union, coercively questioned workers about their union membership, banned workers from displaying union logos on their clothes, laid off pro-union supporters and never recalled them. All this was illegal the NLRB finally ruled - five years later.

After 4 years, Medical Center told to bargain with nurses

In a rare show of support for union rights, just before Labor Day the NLRB told the Virginia Mason Medical Center, which illegally yanked union recognition in 2003 , to get back to bargaining with UFCW Staff Nurses Local 141. The company had quickly accepted a decertification petition that an NLRB judge ruled was illegal back in June, 2004. The national board agreed that it violated the "recognition year" required to allow a new union to get off the ground. Since the company had spent 18 months appealing the union certification, the recognition year didn't start until bargaining got underway, said the Board.

Co-op complex can ban unionists as apartment buyers, says NLRB

Although it's no longer legal for co-ops and condos to say: “No blacks" or "No Jews,” the Bush-appointed NLRB majority just okayed saying "No unionists."

In a 2-1 ruling, the board let Success Village Apartments in Bridgeport, Conn. ban its own unionized workers from buying apartments there. Overruling its administrative law judge, the board claimed that the right to buy an apartment is “not a mandatory subject for bargaining” between the complex and its union, the Auto Workers.

The lone Democrat on the Board argued that the opportunity to buy apartments at Success Village “was… connected to terms and conditions of employment" because it affected things like commuting to work and the ability to work overtime. And the ban is clearly retaliation for workers’exercising their legal union rights.

United Rentals' anti-union tactics illegal, says NLRB

Workers voted union anyhow

United Rentals, Inc. tried everything it could think of to try to stop its 15 workers in Ohio from unionizing with the Operating Engineers. It suspended performance evaluations, perks and pay raises. By a 3-0 vote, the National Labor Relations Board told United to reverse its illegal actions -- none of which worked.

Smithfield breaks off talks with UFCW for fair election, sues union & supporters

Taken from articles by WINS radio service, UFCW & PAI

For more than a decade, workers at Smithfield Foods' huge hog slaughtering plant --the world's largest -- in Tar Heel, North Carolina have been trying to unionize.

After thousands of workers at signed petitions asking for union representation and an end to company threats and abuses, and after some 800 people -- including clergy, community, youth and student activists -- converged on the company's annual shareholders meeting in Williamsburg, Va. in August, it looked like the company was finally getting the message.

Supermarkets pulled Smithfield products

After Boston and other Massachusetts cities passed resolutions supporting the 5,500 workers and calling for Smithfield products to be pulled from supermarket shelves, Boston area Justice @ Smithfield checked and found many major supermarkets had complied.

What workers want is simply a fair unionization process. Abuses were so bad, that the company was cited by Human Rights Watch and the NLRB got Smithfield to pay $1.1 million in back wages, plus interest, to employees fired during past union elections.

It was after Smithfield failed to convince city and town officials to back down that it agreed to negotiate with the United Food and Commercial Workers about conditions for holding a fair election.

''The entire conversation done in bad faith'

But that about-face didn't last long. Smithfield Foods broke off talks and on October 17 sued the union, Jobs with Justice and the Change to Win federation, saying that the public campaign violated federal anti-racketeering law.

Smithfield never had any intention of working with the union,concluded organizer Gene Bruskin . "This is a hundred-page lawsuit. This has been worked on for weeks and weeks," he said. "It really shows the entire conversation with us was done in bad faith."

'An assault on fundamental American values'

The UFCW called it "ironic" that Smithfield, after years of being caught violating labor and environmental law, "now wants to turn to the law to shield its abusive conduct from public exposure." The union blasting the lawsuit as "frivolous" and "an assault on fundamental American values" because it "seeks to prevent organizations from informing and petitioning the public to support causes. . . It ultimately seeks to ensure that only the voices of the powerful are heard. " See full statement

NLRB charged with violating labor rights of its own employees

Union calls for resignation of NLRB General Counsel

Information from Workers Independent News

Protest in 2006 vs. anti-worker bias of NLRB

Chris Garlock

The agency that's supposed to enforce labor law is defying labor law, says the Federal Labor Relations Authority (FLRA), which serves the same role enforcing labor law for the Federal government as the NLRB does for private employers.

The union that represent 1000 NLRB employees held informational pickets outside the D.C. NLRB office on August 15 after the General Counsel Ronald Meisburg refused to bargain with the Union. Meisburg, who was appointed by President Bush in 2006, said he'd go to court to keep four employee groups from consolidating into one bargaining unit -- even after the FLRA approved the consolidation and the Union was certified.

The next week the FLRA issued an unfair labor practice complaint against the NLRB, saying it's violating federal labor law. The union calls for Meisburg's resignation.