The voice of Saint Paul's working families since 1897
Home health care workers in Minnesota have spoken, and they voted decisively to form a union, the state’s Bureau of Mediation Services announced yesterday. Now the fight to improve the lives of home care workers and the people they serve shifts from the organizing field to the negotiation table – and back to the State […]
WYOMING, Minn. – After leading a campaign to raise awareness of potential threats to safe patient care at Fairview Lakes Medical Center, nurses at the Chisago County facility voted yesterday to ratify a new contract that makes progress for both nurses and patients. Nurses at Fairview Lakes are represented by the Minnesota Nurses Association, which […]
Laborers Local 563 today called on the Minnetonka School Board to commission an independent investigation into possible violations of state and federal child-labor laws stemming from construction work at district’s Scenic Heights Elementary School. Earlier this month, the Laborers notified state and federal regulators, as well as the school district, that a minor was apparently […]
Dakota Premium, the only meatpacking plant still operating in South St. Paul, idled production July 2, leaving 300 workers, including 275 members of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1189, out of work indefinitely. Local 1189 President Don Seaquist thinks the closure is more definite than indefinite. “The company’s public statement is that this is […]
The state’s largest labor federation, the Minnesota AFL-CIO, hired Todd Dahlstrom as director of organizing and growth and Bill Breon as coordinator of the Path to Power program this month. Path to Power is the state federation’s new effort to support union members running for public office, ensuring that working Minnesotans have more voice in […]
In the first union-organizing election among faculty members at a private college in Minnesota, adjunct instructors at Hamline University in St. Paul voted to join Local 284 of the Service Employees International Union. Eligible faculty members at Hamline cast their ballots by mail earlier this month. A vote tally took place this morning at the […]
Sam Walton famously required that Walmart employees flash a smile and offer a greeting to anyone coming within 10 feet of their path. Moronica Owens this week discovered a few exceptions to the “10-foot rule” at Walmart’s annual shareholder meetings in Fayetteville, Ark. “I’m a Walmart associate; I know the 10-foot rule,” Owens said. “But […]
The boycott of Staples is official. The AFL-CIO last Friday approved the American Postal Workers Union’s request to add the office-supply retailer to the national federation’s list of endorsed boycotts. The APWU and other postal unions launched the “Stop Staples” campaign earlier this year, after the U.S. Postal Service announced plans to expand a pilot […]
There’s no substitute for the professional judgment and personalized care nurses provide to their patients. That’s the message behind radio and online ads airing across the country, including in Minnesota, that advise the public to “insist on a registered nurse.” National Nurses United, the nation’s largest union of nurses (the Minnesota Nurses Association is a […]
Good news: Downtown St. Paul finally has the full-service grocery store residents have been clamoring for. Even better news: It’s a union shop. After years of planning and waiting, Lunds opened a 27,000-square-foot store on the ground floor of the Penfield Apartments at 10th and Robert streets May 15. The store’s 80 workers are members […]
Union Advocate 