On right to work and prevailing wage, it’s Walz … or Wisconsin

October 24, 2018 by

Tim Walz, the labor-endorsed candidate for governor, is pictured speaking at a union rally in 2016.

When Tim Walz addressed delegates to the Minnesota Building Trades’ annual convention in Duluth over the summer, the labor-endorsed candidate for governor did not mince words, giving the labor leaders and union stewards a message to take back to their union halls.

“People will tell you, ‘I’m not into politics,’” Walz said. “You tell them too damn bad because politics is into you.

“The choice is Walz or Wisconsin when it comes to organized labor. It’s that simple.”

Walz was referencing the string of attacks Wisconsin union members saw on their wages, benefits and freedom to join together after Republicans, led by Gov. Scott Walker, seized total control of the state’s government eight years ago.

It began with Act 10, which gutted the collective bargaining power of teachers and other public-sector workers in 2011. Four years later Walker signed a right-to-work bill, weakening the bargaining power of all unions.

And last year, Wisconsin Republicans unleashed a pair of attacks on union tradespeople and their quality of life. One law banned local governments from entering into project labor agreements, which establish fair wage and benefit standards on construction projects. Another repealed the state’s prevailing-wage law, which builds fair wages into the public construction bidding process.

But it hasn’t just happened in Wisconsin.

“We’ve got to keep Minnesota from going the way of Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Alabama, Kentucky, New Mexico – all states that since 2012 have gone right to work, have banned project labor agreements and have eliminated prevailing wage,” said Tony McGarvey, government affairs liaison for District 82 of the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades.

Already, the effects of Wisconsin’s anti-worker agenda are noticeable even here in Minnesota.

In Rochester, where construction of a Destination Medical Center has helped create a booming job market for tradespeople, Painters Local 681 rep Scott Parker said he sees an “influx of union workers coming over from Wisconsin,” where they would earn less for doing the same work.

“If we go right to work, where do we go? North Dakota? South Dakota? Wisconsin? Iowa?” Parker said. “We are an island surrounded by right to work. Where will I go to make the money I’m making now?”

Prevailing wage: A case study

No issue better represents what’s at stake for construction workers in this election than prevailing wage.

Minnesota’s prevailing wage laws establish wage floors in regions across the state that contractors must agree to meet in order to win bids on publicly funded construction projects. The principle behind the law is that workers should be able to afford to live in the area where they find work.

Opponents argue that repealing the law would save taxpayers money, and as a former state legislator, it’s an argument Carly Melin, now executive director of the Minnesota State Building and Construction Trades Council, has heard plenty of times.

“We know repealing prevailing wage doesn’t save the public any money,” Melin said. “The contractor still makes the money, it’s just the workers who see less of it in their paychecks.”

The vast majority of peer-reviewed academic studies on prevailing wage support Melin’s claim, according to a report issued earlier this year by researchers at the nonpartisan Midwest Economic Policy Institute and Colorado State University-Pueblo.

The report concludes that if Minnesota joins its neighbors in repealing prevailing wage, tradespeople stand to lose their wage advantage and more. “Minnesota’s prevailing wage law supports self-sufficient construction workers,” the report’s authors, Frank Manzo and Dr. Kevin Duncan, concluded.

By comparing data from seven Upper Midwest states, the report found Minnesota tradespeople are doing better than their counterparts in Iowa, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota and Wisconsin – states without strong (or any) prevailing wage laws. Because Minnesota still has prevailing wage on the books, construction workers here see 5.2 percent higher incomes, are more likely to have health and pension benefits, and are less likely to rely on food stamps.

Threat to apprenticeship

In fact, rather than driving up public construction costs, the researchers found Minnesota’s prevailing wage law actually delivers significant value to the state in terms of workforce development.

By setting a higher wage floor, the law guarantees local union contractors a fair shake at publicly bid construction projects. And when Building Trades union members are working, a portion of their wages are deducted to help fund their unions’ apprenticeship training programs, which provide world-class training opportunities to thousands of Minnesotans without any government funding.

Without prevailing wage, the authors conclude, Minnesota contractors who participate in apprenticeship training programs would lose more bids to “fly-by-night contractors from neighboring states with low wages, resulting in fewer training opportunities (not to mention shoddier infrastructure).

That’s the reality Building Trades union members are now facing in states like Wisconsin and Michigan – labor strongholds where “we never would have thought they would repeal prevailing wage,” Melin said. And it’s a threat Minnesota’s Building Trades unions are hoping to keep at bay by electing Tim Walz governor Nov. 6.

“If it can happen in Wisconsin and it can happen in Michigan, then it can happen in Minnesota,” Melin said. “We have a lot at stake.”

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St. Paul workers, families keep pressure on as council takes up $15

October 19, 2018 by

Mayor Melvin Carter snaps a selfie with advocates for a $15 minimum wage outside City Hall.

It felt like a victory celebration as working people and their families rallied with elected officials outside City Hall Wednesday, just minutes before council members formally introduced an ordinance that would put St. Paul on track to a $15 minimum wage.

The finish line may be in sight, but Mayor Melvin Carter had a warning for supporters.

“We’re not done yet,” he said, listing the procedural hurdles and public hearings the ordinance faces before it can receive a vote. “But I’ve committed myself and our city to passing this into law by the end of the year, and I remain committed. And I want to say thank you to all of you for being engaged.”

Carter was speaking to union members, tipped workers and other low-wage workers who have been pushing for action in St. Paul since Minneapolis adopted its ordinance over a year ago. At the rally, they stood together in support of the proposed ordinance, unveiled a week earlier by Mayor Carter.

Co-authored by five of the council’s seven members (Amy Brendmoen, Mitra Jalali Nelson, Rebecca Noecker, Dai Thao and Chris Tolbert), the ordinance closely mirrors recommendations of a task force that spent more than three months studying the potential effects of a wage hike and listening to workers, business owners and others who would be impacted by the ordinance.

“We have been listening, talking, debating and voting for almost a year now,” said SEIU Healthcare Minnesota Political Director Rick Varco, who co-chaired the task force. “Now is the time to act.”

Action by the council would raise wages for an estimated 56,000 people – nearly a third of the city’s workforce – who earn less than $15 an hour.

Rosalio Vences, a janitor at a Target store in St. Paul, is among them. The cleaning contractor he works for has raised his pay just once – from $11 to $11.25 per hour – in the nearly three years Vences has been on the job. Lately, he said, the boss has been cutting hours off his scheduled shifts, too.

“But they always give us a raise in workload,” Vences said. “We always have more work to do, faster and faster.”

With the extra money he’d be earning with a $15 minimum wage, Vences could afford to move out of the room he rents in someone else’s home and get his own place. “With our current wages, we can’t afford to pay our rent and our bills,” he said.

Erin Lynch, a server at a full-service restaurant in St. Paul, speaks at a press conference staged by supporters of a $15 minimum wage with no tip adjustment.

Servers like Erin Lynch also praised the proposed ordinance, which would not carve out a lower wage for workers who earn tips. The question of whether to include a so-called “tip adjustment” has been a focus of debate, but Lynch said earning a livable wage makes servers more likely to stand up to harassment from customers and managers who “wave the prospect of a tip over your head.”

Restaurant workers experience sexual harassment on the job more frequently than workers in any other industry. A 2014 report by the Restaurant Opportunities Center United found 9 of 10 women working in the industry had experienced sexual harassment on the job, and so had 7 of 10 men. Sexual harassment is more prevalent, the report found, in states that allow servers and bartenders to be paid less than minimum wage.

“It’s really demoralizing that me and my coworkers have to put up with this stuff every day, to varying amounts,” Lynch said. “A $15 an hour minimum wage would alleviate this and would lessen my dependence on tips. It puts me in a better position to stand up for my dignity.”

The ordinance, as currently drafted, would take effect in 2020, and would affect employers differently based on their size.

Large businesses – those with more than 100 workers – would be required to pay $15 per hour by July 1, 2023. Workers at small businesses would reach $15 by July 1, 2026. Microbusinesses – those with five or fewer employees – would have two more years to phase in the full minimum wage, which would adjust annually for inflation.

The ordinance also would put the city’s own employees on track to earn $15 by July 1, 2022.

The Met Council’s most recent analysis of census data shows 40.8 percent of St. Paul residents live in poverty, a higher rate than any other metro-area community.

“We’re so grateful to the mayor for having listened to our words to help bring change with our employers,” Vences, a member of the Twin Cities worker center CTUL, said. “For so long we’ve been lifting our voices to say we need a raise to $15 an hour.”

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Workers trust Ellison to have their back as AG

October 11, 2018 by
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U.S. Rep Keith Ellison, the labor-endorsed candidate for state attorney general, received a warm reception from union members during a meeting at the St. Paul Labor Center last night.

Deb Howze fought hard to get a union. Now, the home care worker from Minneapolis is fighting to stop politicians like Doug Wardlow from taking it away.

The state’s home care workers have successfully bargained for wage increases, paid time off, holiday pay and new training opportunities since organizing with SEIU Healthcare Minnesota four years ago. But they also have become the target of corporate special interests trying to roll back those gains with lawsuits and phony anti-union campaigns.

“If Doug Wardlow were attorney general, he would join these attempts and try to reverse the progress we have made,” Howze said.

How can she be so sure?

Hostility toward unions and attacks on workers’ freedom to join together form a common thread running through Wardlow’s career. Howze and other union members traced that thread during a press conference today in St. Paul with the labor-endorsed attorney general candidate, U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison.

During the two years Wardlow represented Eagan in the Minnesota House, the Republican led efforts to get a “right to work” constitutional amendment on the ballot, cut state employees’ pay and repeal a state law requiring local governments to ensure women are paid the same as men.

Joe Fowler, business manager of Laborers Local 563, said Wardlow also attacked Minnesota’s prevailing wage law, which builds fair wage and benefit standards into the bidding process for public construction projects. For people who work in the Building Trades, Fowler said, having an attorney general who enforces prevailing wage is critical to their standard of living.

“Laws only protect the honest from the honest,” Fowler said. “Enforcement is what keeps the dishonest from taking advantage of the honest.”

By contrast, Ellison has earned the trust and support of union members as a dependable, energetic advocate on workers’ behalf.

“Our members know Keith has stood with them over the years on every front,” Minnesota Nurses Association President Mary C. Turner said.

Jennifer Christensen, president of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1189, said Ellison understands the economy is rigged in favor of corporations and the rich, and they too often treat workers “with little regard, as mere commodities and numbers.”

Ellison, she added, is someone union members can trust to hold corporations to their obligations during mergers, acquisitions, relocations and other “stressful” events.

“We need an attorney general who’s going to hold these big companies responsible and accountable if they don’t … honor their union contracts,” Christensen said.

On the campaign trail, Ellison has said he wants to be the “people’s lawyer.” He has pledged to crack down on corporations that violate safety regulations or don’t pay workers what they are owed. One report estimates wage theft costs 390,000 Minnesota workers – from a wide range of industries – nearly $12 million each year.

“I think it is the job of the Minnesota attorney general to stand with workers and say, if you put in a hard day’s work, you will get a hard day’s pay,” Ellison said. “But it’s not enough to have good laws; we’ve got to have good people who enforce those laws.”

Ellison also promised to defend working people against the corporate special interests funding legal attacks – like the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent Janus decision – on their freedoms.

“These special interests already have high-powered lawyers on their side,” Ellison said. “They don’t need another one in the Attorney General’s Office.”

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Union pipefitters make furnace repairs for homeowners in need

October 3, 2018 by

Mel MacFarlane (L), a journey-level pipefitter with Local 455, and third-year apprentice Ben Woodis ran a service heck for St. Paul resident Mary Kujawa during the Heat’s On service day Sept. 29.

Some 200 union tradespeople spent their day off Saturday inspecting and repairing furnaces at no cost to senior, low-income and disabled homeowners across Minnesota.

Volunteers with Project Heat’s On, the service day launched in 1986 by unions and their signatory contractors, came from three Pipefitters locals: St. Paul- and Mankato-based Local 455, Rochester-based Local 6 and Minneapolis- and St. Cloud-based Local 539.

Together, union members prepared 140 home furnaces for winter, making repairs that will reduce energy costs and prevent heating failures.

“St. Paul Steamfitters/Pipefitters Local 455 started Heat’s On in 1986, and it has been an overwhelming success,” Local 455 Assistant Business Manager Tony Poole said. “The following year, Local 539 made it a joint effort.

“Since then our members have donated thousands of man-hours helping low-income residents in the metro area by inspecting and making repairs to their home heating systems. It has been great to give back to the community.”

Since the project’s inception, volunteers have donated more than 35,000 hours of labor – at a value of $3,841,975 – to 8,144 households through the Heat’s On program.

Mel MacFarlane, a journey-level pipefitter with Local 455, and third-year apprentice Ben Woodis ran a basic service and operations check for Mary Kujawa, who lives in St. Paul’s North End neighborhood.

Kujawa said she wanted to be sure her furnace would make it to the holidays, when she plans on hosting her children and more than 40 grandchildren. MacFarlane, in his fourth year as a Heat’s On volunteer, saw no red flags during his inspection.

“She’s going to be set for the heating season,” MacFarlane said. “If nothing else, we delivered some piece of mind here today – and a few moments of companionship.”

Heat’s On is a combined effort of Pipefitters unions and the Minnesota Mechanical Contractors Association, which provides materials and parts for repairs, as well as four Community Action Partnership agencies (Hennepin County, Ramsey and Washington Counties, Three Rivers, and Tri-County), which identify homeowners in need.

Learn more about Project Heat’s On at www.mnpipetrades.com/heatson.php.

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Fight for $15 moves to city hall

September 12, 2018 by

Supporters of a $15 minimum wage ordinance display more than 2,000 petitions signed by supporters at a press conference outside city hall.

After months of neighborhood organizing that sometimes spilled over into the streets, St. Paul workers who want a higher minimum wage are bringing their fight to city hall.

“We have waited over a year as the city has discussed this issue,” said Pastor James Erlandson of Lutheran Church of the Redeemer in St. Paul. “The time for debate is over. It’s time to pass the ordinance.”

Erlandson and other supporters of a $15 minimum wage staged a press conference today in advance of the City Council’s public hearing on the issue tonight.

The hearing will follow a presentation by the Citizens League on the findings of a committee charged with studying the issue over the summer. The 21 business owners, low-wage workers, nonprofit executives and other stakeholders did not issue a stand-alone recommendation to the council. Rather, they forwarded three “scenarios for consideration,” all of which would put St. Paul on the path to a $15 minimum wage, with annual inflationary increases.

That’s a big win for low-wage workers in St. Paul and the organizations – unions included – fighting to raise the wage. It’s a win, too, for the city’s voters, who elected Mayor Melvin Carter to a landslide victory last fall on a platform that included full-throated support for $15.

Tou Vang, an organizer with Hmong Americans for Justice, praised the committee for recognizing the “crisis of poverty” in St. Paul. It’s estimated that one of every four St. Paul workers earns less than $15 per hour, and 40.8 percent of St. Paul residents live in poverty, a higher rate than any other metro-area community.

“In addition to the committee’s research and discussion, it’s clear the outcomes of the process were influenced by years of workers rallying, striking and organizing for living wages and dignity,” Vang added.

(Citizens League)

Carve outs still at issue

While the study committee’s three scenarios all embrace $15, they do provide exemptions for city-approved youth training programs and employers who hire workers with disabilities. The scenarios also differ in how long employers would have to phase in the full $15 minimum wage ­(between four and seven years, depending on the size of the employer).

One scenario includes a subminimum wage for tipped workers in “full service restaurants,” which unions and many restaurant workers oppose. In fact, the study committee included a scenario with the “tip credit,” as its known to supporters, even though it failed to receive support from a majority of committee members.

The issue has been a point of contention at two public input sessions hosted by the city so far. (Two more sessions are scheduled later this month.)

Servers and bartenders in many states with a subminimum “tipped wage” rely almost entirely on their customers’ goodwill for their incomes, a dynamic that, as several studies show, puts workers at a greater risk of experiencing sexual harassment and wage theft.

Erin Lynch, a tipped worker in St. Paul, said she already experiences sexual harassment on the job, even though Minnesota is one of seven “equal treatment states,” with no tip credit on the books.

“I’m forced to weigh my dignity in these situations against my income in the form of tips,” Lynch said. “A tip penalty forces workers like me to rely more on tips in situations like these, and to put up with inappropriate behavior to supplement my income.”

A push to be bold

As council members begin the work of crafting an ordinance, two recently released reports provide fodder for advocates pushing strong, progressive action.

Last week researchers at the University of California Berkely issued an analysis of trends in the first six major U.S. cities to raise the minimum wage higher than $10. The team of economists found significant pay increases and, critically, no significant employment reductions in the six cities.

“When these minimum wage policies were being considered, some predicted that they would lead to significant job losses,” co-author Carl Nadler said. “We did not find such job losses. We did find that these cities’ minimum wage policies increased the earnings of low-wage workers, just as intended.”

Earlier this year Working America, the community affiliate of the AFL-CIO, surveyed more than 500 people working in St. Paul, and their responses, analyzed in a report issued last month, shed more light on the city’s crisis of poverty.

Nearly half of workers reported earning $10 per hour or less, with 90 percent earning less than $15. Half of those surveyed said their income provides support for someone else – a loved one or family member – as well as themselves.

What would $15 mean for workers surveyed? Paying down debt or paying bills on time was the most frequent response. Others included improved housing options, less anxiety and more time with family.

That’s the case for Marfa Malcolm, who shuttles between three different jobs as a caregiver, and her 16-year-old daughter, who works in food service on weekends to help support their family.

“There are days when I work the overnight shift and I come in by 8 o’clock, and she’s gone to school,” Malcolm said outside city hall today. “When I go home and she’s home, I have to be doing my other part-time job. I can’t get to spend time with her, and she really needs me.

“So if you value family, I think you should pass $15 now.”

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Labor unites behind Walz for governor

August 16, 2018 by

Tim Walz talks with union members at a Helmets to Hardhats event in Duluth last month.

After emerging as the Minnesota DFL’s nominee for governor on primary-election night, Tim Walz today won the endorsement of the state’s largest labor federation, the Minnesota AFL-CIO.

With the endorsement, Minnesota’s unions join forces to elect one of their own to the state’s highest office. Walz worked as a classroom teacher and coach for 20 years before winning a seat in Congress, and he was a member of Education Minnesota, the statewide educators union.

Because of his experience as a teacher and union member, Walz “understands first-hand the importance of protecting working people’s freedom to join together in union to negotiate a fair return on their work,” Minnesota AFL-CIO President Bill McCarthy said.

Keeping an ally in the governor’s office is the top election-year priority for the federation and its 1,000-plus affiliate unions, which represent more than 300,000 working people statewide.

Union members have much at stake. Since the 2010 election, Minnesota and Gov. Mark Dayton have charted a very different course than most other Midwestern states, where Republican governors have pursued a steady erosion of working people’s freedoms.

Indiana, Michigan and Wisconsin passed “right-to-work” laws that weaken unions’ bargaining power. The same three states recently repealed prevailing-wage laws that build fair wages into the bidding process for public construction projects – a direct attack on union tradespeople’s quality of life.

And Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker remains infamous for Act 10, a blunt attack on public workers’ wages, benefits and union rights that served as a model for GOP lawmakers in other Midwest states – and aspiring lawmakers, too. Walz’s opponent in the Nov. 6 election, Jeff Johnson, promised during his failed campaign for governor four years ago that he would “go all Scott Walker on Minnesota” if elected.

Dayton, meanwhile, signed legislation expanding collective bargaining rights to more than 20,000 home care workers, and he used his veto pen to fend off Walker-inspired style attacks on public workers and prevailing wage.

Unions trust Walz to govern similarly.

“Working people can count on Minnesota AFL-CIO endorsed candidates to share our values,” Secretary-Treasurer Brad Lehto said. “We can count on Tim and Peggy because they value our freedom to negotiate a fair return on our work, so we can provide for our families; workplaces where we are safe and respected; and the freedom to retire with dignity.”

At a union-sponsored debate in February, Walz told activists he would be an “organizer-in-chief” as governor. “This is about us taking a message beyond the four walls that we’re in,” he said.

He also said he would recruit teachers and high-road businesses from Wisconsin, where Walker’s anti-union agenda has driven educators away from the profession and left wages stagnant.

Prior to representing the 1st Congressional District in southern Minnesota, Walz taught and coached football at Mankato West High School for 12 years. He was named Mankato Teacher of the Year and a Minnesota Teacher of Excellence in 2003.

Walz also served 24 years in the Army National Guard, including a deployment overseas in support of Operation Enduring Freedom. He retired in 2005 as a command sergeant major, the highest-ranking enlisted National Guard soldier in southern Minnesota.

Flanagan is a state lawmaker from St. Louis Park and former director of the Children’s Defense Fund-Minnesota. She is a citizen of the White Earth Nation of Ojibwe.

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DFL campaign workers unionize

August 14, 2018 by

MN_DFL_blue_previewCampaign workers at Minnesota’s Democratic Farmer Labor Party joined the labor movement last week.

After a majority of DFL coordinated campaign workers expressed support for the union drive, two worker representatives approached party chair Ken Martin on Friday with a request for voluntary recognition of their union, which he granted.

“Campaign workers are at risk for long hours, low wages, exploitative conditions and hostile work environments,” DFL coordinated campaign worker Nathan Lewicki said. “Forming a union protects the workforce and ensures fairness for all.”

Although the bargaining unit has yet to be finalized, more than 50 DFL staffers are likely to be eligible, according to Ihaab Syed, secretary of the Campaign Workers Guild. It marks the CWG’s largest successful organizing drive since launching as an independent, nationwide union last year.

CWG currently represents about 125 non-management workers on issue-based and political campaigns in eight states. That already includes Minnesota, where workers on two active political campaigns have collective bargaining agreements.

The fledgling union will nearly double its membership once coordinated campaign workers in Ohio and Minnesota approve first contracts. Coordinated campaigns are the core organizing apparatus for state Democratic parties during major elections.

Syed said DFL workers pressed Martin to recognize their bargaining unit last week so that the issue would be settled before the party’s get-out-the-vote blitz for today’s statewide primary election.

The state’s largest labor federation, the Minnesota AFL-CIO, cheered DFL workers’ decision to unionize.

“We commend the DFL Party and Chair Ken Martin for voluntarily recognizing their workers’ choice to organize with the Campaign Workers Guild,” Minnesota AFL-CIO President Bill McCarthy said. “All working people, whether they be educators, construction workers, nurses, or campaign staff, should have the freedom to join together to negotiate a fair return on their work.”

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Mitra Jalali Nelson: Labor endorsed in St. Paul’s Ward 4

August 6, 2018 by

Mitra Jalali Nelson thanks delegates to the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation for their support.

Renters outnumber homeowners in St. Paul, but there are no renters on the city council. That’s something Mitra Jalali Nelson is out to change.

Nelson, the labor-endorsed candidate in a special election Aug. 14 to fill St. Paul’s Ward 4 seat, has drawn on her experience as a renter to craft a “blueprint” of policy proposals aimed at making housing in St. Paul more affordable, like zoning rules that allow development of more rental stock and programs that support aspiring homeowners.

Nelson is thinking big. And as a former union organizer and current aide to U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, she has firsthand experience turning big ideas into reality.

The self-described “organizer at heart” knows it takes teamwork to make meaningful change.

“I look forward to working hand-in-hand with workers, unions and partners citywide to address income inequality head-on, and achieve citywide progress that brings all of us with it,” Nelson said.

‘The rent won’t wait’

Nelson has positioned herself as a champion of affordable housing from the start of her bid for City Hall. She won labor’s backing, meanwhile, by connecting the dots between her top issue and the things St. Paul unions fight for every day – good jobs, quality public services and strong public schools.

Affordable housing, Nelson said, is “key to ending income inequality” and, in St. Paul, a “crisis” that demands urgent attention.

Recent data from the Census Bureau backs up her claim. It shows 51 percent of renters are in “cost-burdened” situations, meaning they spend more than 30 percent of their income on rent. Too often, Nelson said, the amount is closer to half.

“When people spend most of their income on housing, they’re forced to buy fewer groceries, skip a doctor’s appointment, forego school supplies and spend less in St. Paul businesses,” she said. “Foregoing action on this issue is holding our city back.”

A leading contributor to St. Paul’s affordable housing crisis? Rents are going up faster than working people’s wages. Over the last 25 years, median rents have increased by 9 percent, when adjusted for inflation, while median household incomes have fallen by 3 percent.

Backers of a $15 minimum wage ordinance in St. Paul have printed shirts with their rallying cry: “15 Now because the rent won’t wait.” Nelson said she supports $15 “without any exemptions.”

“I support passing one fair wage for our city and will work with community partners toward a $15 minimum wage citywide without any exemptions,” she said. “As the costs of living rise, our wages have been stagnant, and we need to take significant action locally to address this.”

But the city can also do more to make rental housing more affordable, she said.

“We need to act on our affordable housing crisis, using tools at the city level like inclusionary zoning and upzoning to help create more affordable units throughout the Ward and our city,” Nelson said. “We also need help from the county and state, and I will advocate for and seek additional resources to support the construction of more affordable housing, including public housing.

“As a renter, I am running to organize a coalition of renters and homeowners alike to achieve progress on this issue.”

Unions impressed

Barb Herrington-Hall, who retired this summer after 33 years as an educator, participated in the St. Paul Federation of Teachers’ screening process in Ward 4. She came away impressed with Nelson’s vision, energy and grasp of the issues facing St. Paul.

Nelson’s passion for affordable housing struck a chord with Herrington-Hall, whose job involved making house calls to families in the district to screen children for special education services.

“I’ve been in apartments that the number of people living there, the quality of the housing, it would break your heart,” Herrington-Hall, a Ward 4 resident, said. “And it’s parents who have to work multiple jobs just to pay the rent.

“As educators, we know these parents aren’t able to come to meetings at conference time or help their child with homework. So I see the difference it would make if parents only had to work one full-time job.”

Herrington-Hall also knows Nelson does more than talk about supporting union members.

“The first time I met her she was participating in a rally in front of the school board building to support our bargaining team,” Herrington-Hall said. “Mitra was there in the crowd before she was ever endorsed, standing out in the cold with the rest of us.”

On the web

• Learn more about Nelson’s campaign at www.mitranelson.com.

• View a list of labor-endorsed candidates on the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation’s website.

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Supreme Court ‘weaponizes’ First Amendment to attack public-sector workers

June 27, 2018 by

FB_DecisionDay2In a 5-4 decision along party lines, the U.S. Supreme Court today altered the landscape of public-sector collective bargaining in Minnesota and more than 20 other states.

The high court’s ruling in Janus v. AFSCME makes “right-to-work” the law of the land in all public-sector workplaces, opening the door for more workers to reap the benefits of a union contract without sharing in its costs.

Justice Samuel Alito, writing for the majority, argued that states like Minnesota, which allowed public-sector unions to assess “fair-share fees” to non-members, violated those workers’ First Amendment rights to freedom of speech – or, in this case, freedom not to subsidize speech on their behalf.

Alito’s decision overturns a precedent more than four decades in the making, and it gives corporate interests and billionaires who bankrolled the legal challenge a victory for which they had been angling for years.

Union leaders in Minnesota warned the decision would make it harder for working people to join together and advocate for their families and communities, rigging the economy even more in favor of corporations and the wealthy.

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Working people rally in Minneapolis, pledging to stick together in the wake of today’s Janus v. AFSCME ruling.

But Minnesota AFL-CIO President Bill McCarthy, the state’s top labor leader, said working people aren’t giving up their voice.

“No court decision will ever stop working people from joining together in union to negotiate a fair return on their work,” he said. “No matter how many roadblocks corporate special interests put in our path, our state’s labor movement will continue to fight for working Minnesotans’ freedom to prosper.”

Public-sector unions have been bracing for a major blow from the Supreme Court for more than two years. During that time, most have taken steps to strengthen their membership and encourage as many fee-payers to become full members as they can.

Janus is the third in a string of decisions weakening public workers’ bargaining power on First Amendment grounds, and Alito has been a driving force behind all three. His arguments in today’s decision are at times nakedly political, blaming collective bargaining for some states’ underfunded public pension systems and the growth of government spending nationwide.

Alito’s decision also draws a disturbingly shallow parallel between public-sector unions and other advocacy organizations that purport to “speak” on behalf of a unique constituency, like the AARP and the VFW. Alito asks: “Could the government require that all seniors, veterans, doctors pay for that service even if they object?”

The point Alito either ignores or misses is that the VFW can offer unique benefits to people who join, while unions are required by federal labor law to provide the same contractual benefits and representation to everyone in a bargaining unit — even workers who choose not to join.

In her dissenting opinion, Justice Elena Kagan accuses Alito and his fellow conservatives on the bench of waging a “6-year crusade to ban (fair-share) fees,” with disregard for precedent the high court has “rarely if ever” seen.

“Unions are — by law — in a different position, as this Court has long recognized” than other advocacy groups, Kagan writes. Fair-share fees “ensured that a union would receive sufficient funds, despite its legally imposed disability, to effectively carry out its duties as exclusive representative of the government’s employees.”

Kagan’s dissent points to equally troubling decisions ahead if the conservative majority continues, in her pointed language, “weaponizing the First Amendment.” She writes:

“Speech is everywhere — a part of every human activity (employment, health care, securities trading, you name it). For that reason, almost all economic and regulatory policy affects or touches speech. So the majority’s road runs long. And at every stop are black-robed rulers overriding citizens’ choices. The First Amendment was meant for better things. It was meant not to undermine but to pro­tect democratic governance — including over the role of public-sector unions.”

Time will tell how Janus impacts public-sector unions in Minnesota. But a string of wildcat strikes by teachers in West Virginia, Arizona, and other right-to-work states this spring prompted some to wonder if the deep-pocketed donors behind Janus are poised to wake a sleeping giant.

“Neither this ruling nor the right-wing groups that will weaponize it, will silence the voices of Minnesota’s professional educators,” Education Minnesota President Denise Specht said. “We will still stand for effective and welcoming schools for our students, proud and healthy communities for their parents, and salaries and benefits that will sustain the families of Minnesota educators.”

 

Filed Under: Organizing, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

With pension and bonding bills, Dayton saves best for last

May 31, 2018 by

Gov. Dayton signs a bill to stabilize pensions covering more than 500,000 Minnesotans during a ceremony at the Capitol.

Common ground between Gov. Mark Dayton and the Republican-controlled Legislature was in short supply at the Capitol this year, but lawmakers were able to compromise on two bills that union members lobbied hard for during the recently ended session.

Dayton gave final approval yesterday to a bill authorizing more than $1.4 billion in jobs-creating infrastructure investments across the state. The bonding bill will create thousands of construction jobs, Minnesota State Building and Construction Trades Council President Harry Melander said.

Today, Dayton signed a bipartisan bill to stabilize pension funds covering more than 500,000 public-sector workers, the last item of unfinished business from the 2018 session.

“This may be Gov. Dayton’s last signing of a legislative bill, but he saved the best for last,” AFSCME Council 5 Legislative Director Julie Bleyhl said.

Missed opportunities

Still, the DFL governor expressed regret that his last session before leaving office failed to make progress on issues like tax relief for working families, emergency funding for local school districts and needed investments in public transit.

Last week Dayton vetoed a tax bill and massive “omnibus” budget bill. The governor, who made his opposition to both bills known throughout the legislative process, chided Republican leaders for forging ahead on their own rather than engaging in negotiations.

“Never have I seen a legislative session so badly mismanaged, less transparent, and more beholden to monied special interests,” Dayton wrote in a letter accompanying the budget bill’s veto.

Bunny Engeldorf, a registered nurse at United Hospital in St. Paul, speaks at a rally for “Minnesota values” sponsored by a coalition of progressive groups, including the Minnesota Nurses Association and SEIU Healthcare MN, during the final week of the 2018 session.

Union leaders shared Dayton’s disappointment.

Bill McCarthy, president of the state’s largest labor federation, the Minnesota AFL-CIO, said the tax bill was stuffed with perks for corporations and would have needlessly risked Minnesota’s fiscal stability.

“The Republican tax bill would have handed big corporations a permanent tax giveaway of at least $200 million dollars and created future budget deficits, while only paying lip service to working people and K-12 students,” McCarthy said. “Instead of directly investing in priorities that all Minnesotans agree on, Republicans in the Legislature tied these measures to special interest-backed policies and let big pharma off the hook for their role in the opioid crisis.”

Education issues weren’t prominent when the session began, but a string of deadly school shootings in other parts of the country thrust campus safety onto lawmakers’ agenda. And when districts across the state began announcing layoffs, Dayton responded with a proposal to put part of the state’s budget surplus into a one-time aid package.

Republicans wrapped both school security and their own, watered-down aid package into the budget and tax bills, which Dayton vetoed. But Denise Specht, president of Education Minnesota, refused to let legislative leaders off the hook for packing “important and popular priorities, like school safety, into a sludge of bad ideas that will create problems for schools and communities for many years.”

Some pressing issues, like home health care, never even made it into the final budget bill, despite mounting evidence that low wages and lack of benefits are contributing to a shortage of care workers in the state.

“Home care workers and our clients came to the Capitol throughout the session to make sure our elected officials understood the crisis facing families in every corner of the state,” said Dawn Burnfin of Chisolm, a member of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota. “Make no mistake, inaction means more pain, frustration and heartache for families across Minnesota.”

Finishing on a positive note

Gov. Dayton mugs with AFSCME members after signing the pension bill.

Although gridlock hampered progress on most issues, Dayton “firmly cemented his legacy as a champion for working people” with the pension and infrastructure-jobs bills he signed this week, McCarthy said.

Dayton signed the pension bill, which passed both the House and Senate without dissent, during a public ceremony at the Capitol today.

The measure requires current workers, employers and retirees to share in the sacrifice of fully funding public pensions in Minnesota over the next 30 years. It increases employee and employer contributions, reduces cost-of-living adjustments and draws some state funding, and it will immediately clear $3.4 billion in unfunded liabilities off the state’s books.

A coalition of public-sector unions, including AFSCME and Education Minnesota, supported the bill. Council 5’s Bleyhl called it a “towering achievement” that will keep the state’s pension system solvent for decades to come.

“With the signing of this bill, public workers are now assured of a secure and dignified retirement, which they’ve earned through their dedicated years of work serving the public,” she said.

The $1.4 billion bonding bill invests in college and university facilities, roads, bridges and other public projects. Dayton signed the bill despite criticizing it for being too modest.

“I am signing this bill, despite my objections, because areas throughout Minnesota need the projects and the jobs, which it will provide,” he said.

Melander said the Building Trades supported the governor’s more robust bonding proposal – “the bigger the bill, the more opportunities people have to feed their families” – but remain appreciative of the compromise measure.

“Minnesota’s Building Trades members are grateful for all of the good work that Gov. Dayton has done for the last eight years,” Melander added. “He will always be remembered as a great governor for Building Trades members.”

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