For working families, 2015 session yields mixed results – and uncertainty

May 19, 2015 by
The Move MN Coalition launched a "Duct Tape Tour" of the state from MnDOT headquarters in St. Paul this morning.

The Move MN Coalition launched a “Duct Tape Tour” of the state from MnDOT headquarters in St. Paul this morning.

The frenzied finish at the Capitol yielded mixed – and uncertain – results for Minnesota’s working families.

Although the Legislature approved a record investment in long-term care before adjourning last night, unions said lawmakers squandered an opportunity to use the state’s $1.9 billion budget surplus to restore cuts to public schools, expand access to pre-kindergarten and rebuild the state’s transportation infrastructure.

School employees held out hope for improvement on the Legislature’s $400 million package of funding for K-12 public schools. Gov. Mark Dayton, who made expanded access to pre-kindergarten his top priority this year, today vetoed the bill.

In a letter to Republican House Speaker Kurt Daudt, the DFL governor noted that the Legislature’s proposed increase to the K-12 education budget is smaller than increase lawmakers approved two years ago, when they faced a projected deficit of $627 million.

Dayton called it “incomprehensible that estate tax cuts for millionaires and property tax relief for large corporations are higher priorities for your House Republican Caucus than investing adequately in our students and young children.”

Dayton’s veto will recall legislators into a special session – a prospect welcomed by Education Minnesota, the union of 70,000 educators, and Local 284 of the Service Employees International Union.

“We can do better than a formula increase that only limits layoffs,” Education Minnesota President Denise Specht said. “We can reduce class sizes and start to bring back art, music, world languages, physical education and other courses we’ve lost to cuts over the years. We can also give all families access to high-quality preschool, not just a targeted few. There’s still a huge surplus. If not now, when?”

Carol Nieters, executive director of Local 284, said the Legislature’s bill would leave school districts across the state struggling to keep up with rising inflationary costs.

“The debate may be ongoing, but our members know the importance of funding that keeps up with inflation and allows school districts to maintain their buildings, particularly in Greater Minnesota,” Nieters said. “Anything less for our students is unacceptable.”

Transportation advocates, meanwhile, resigned themselves to continuing to push for a comprehensive, long-term plan to rebuild and repair the states roads, bridges and transit ways.

Members of the union-backed, pro-transportation Move MN Coalition today launched a three-day, 10-city “Duct Tape Tour” from St. Paul, warning that short-term, “lights-on” investments aren’t enough for the state’s aging transportation infrastructure.

“To say we are disappointed would be a huge understatement,” said Todd Pufahl, president and business manager for the Laborers District Council of Minnesota and North Dakota. “This issue isn’t going to go away. And future improvements will only cost Minnesotans more.”

On the tour members of the coalition, which includes unions, business groups and non-profit organizations, will visit potential transportation-construction sites across the state left to languish without state funding, and they will hear from local residents about the consequences of inaction for their local communities.

“As Minnesotans, we know duct tape is pretty amazing stuff, but there are things it can’t fix,” said Pufahl. “You can’t use duct tape to fill in a pot hole. You can’t use it to shore up a crumbling bridge. You can’t use it to mark a bike lane. And most importantly, you can’t use it to fix the gaping hole in transportation funding.”

Legislators also failed to agree on a new safety regulation requiring two-person crews on most freight trains passing through the state, a measure backed by the United Transportation Union. The bill advanced to the Senate floor, but failed to gain traction in the House.

“Our minimum crew requirement remains controversial to the Republican House leadership … despite our best efforts and one-on-one conversations with Republican members,” UTU Minnesota Legislative Director Phil Qualy said.

While much of the public focus was on the rift over education funding, lawmakers quietly passed the most significant increase in long-term care support in 30 years.

The measure, included in the nearly $13 billion health and human services budget, does not require a particular percentage of the payment increase to go to wages, but pay for long-term care workers is expected to go up.

“For long-term care workers, especially in Greater Minnesota, the advocacy of front line staff and other supporters over the last few years paid off with record funding for this important work,” said Jamie Gulley, president of SEIU Healthcare Minnesota, one of several unions that represent long-term care workers. “Investing in the health and safety of Minnesotans is always a good investment, and we are proud that SEIU Healthcare Minnesota members fought so hard to make this a reality in the long-term care field.”

The Minnesota Nurses Association also praised the Legislature for taking steps to prevent violence against workers in health care facilities, following a dramatic attack on staff at St. John’s Hospital in Maplewood last November. Under the new law, hospitals will be required to create and implement violence prevention plans.

“We saw a horrific event at St. John’s,” MNA President Linda Hamilton said. “The truth is nurses are assaulted in hospitals and nursing homes every day. They’re pinched, hit, and kicked by patients and their families. We’re glad to see efforts that will protect nurses and other healthcare workers from violence.”

– This report includes material from Workday Minnesota.

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Gold watch? Fountain pen? For 25th anniversary, AT&T guts MN workers’ sick leave

May 13, 2015 by
CWA Local 7250 members impacted by AT&T's sick-pay policy include Susan Anderson,

CWA Local 7250 members impacted by AT&T’s sick-pay policy include Susan Anderson (green coat), Dan Waalen-Radzevicius (black coat) and Deb Derke (red shirt).

Members of Local 7250 of the Communications Workers of America called a grievance strike yesterday. About 200 workers picketed outside AT&T’s offices downtown Minneapolis in support of their longest-tenured co-workers, who have seen requests for sick pay denied by the company.

AT&T claims it’s not required to allow workers with 25 or more years of experience to use their paid-sick time to care for family members – even though workers with less than 25 years experience can.

It’s an interpretation of a new state law that AT&T is defending in federal court. But in the meantime, where does that leave employees who have given a quarter-century or more to the Fortune 500 telecommunications company?

On the picket line yesterday, Debra Derke estimated she’s lost about eight months’ pay since her husband suffered a heart attack in August 2013 – the first in a string of major health crises. Derke’s husband suffered a second heart attack in March and is now paralyzed.

“We have a lot of doctor’s appointments that I need to attend. There are a lot of times when the PCA’s don’t show up. I’ve got to take care of him,” Derke said. “That’s my new normal. Every day I wake up to find out whether I can or can’t come to work.”

And though her contract says she has access to paid sick time, AT&T won’t let Derke use it to care for her husband, in effect, because she’s been with the company too long.

“It will be 30 years on Oct. 28, 30 years of my life supporting this company,” Derke said. “(AT&T CEO) Randall Stephenson hasn’t been there that long.”

Derke’s case is the most extreme, but other Minnesotans have filed grievances related to AT&T’s sick-pay policy as well.

Dan Waalen-Radzevicius requested four paid-sick days to care for his husband, whose injuries resulting from a stray-cat attack became seriously infected and left him drifting in and out of consciousness. Susan Anderson requested one paid-sick day to care for her husband as he began his battle against prostate cancer.

Waalen-Radzevicius has 29 years’ experience at AT&T; Anderson has 34. AT&T denied both workers’ requests.

“It’s absolutely ridiculous,” Waalen-Radzevicius said. “Our CEO made $20 million-plus last year, plus bonuses, plus trips – everything. And he can’t afford to pay us this minimal amount?”

CWA estimates only about 100 workers statewide fall into the gap created by AT&T’s sick-pay policy, but workers of all ages and experience levels walked alongside Derke, Waalen-Radzevicius and Anderson on the picket line yesterday. Divide-and-conquer tactics won’t work with this group, they said.

“Someday they’re going to be in our shoes,” Anderson said of less experienced workers. “It’s great they’re supporting us. It’s what unions are all about.”

Union members look out for each other, Derke added, just like family members take care of each other.

“It’s beautiful,” she said. “It’s so heartwarming to know I’m not alone here. We all work here, and we are family.”

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St. Paul City Council takes stance against ‘poor trade policies,’ including fast track

April 24, 2015 by

fb_fasttrack_call2The St. Paul City Council took up the fight to stop fast track Wednesday, when members unanimously approved a resolution “opposing the extension of bad trade policies.”

“The people of the City of Saint Paul have the best chance to benefit from pending trade and investment agreements only if the process by which they are negotiated undergoes a transformation to make the process open, fair and inclusive,” the resolution says.

Click here to read the full text.

Congress is considering a new fast track bill that, like previous versions, would force members to approve or reject – but not amend – trade agreements negotiated by the president’s trade ambassadors, like the 1,000-page Trans-Pacific Partnership.

By passing the resolution, members of the council joined union members, environmentalists, faith leaders and others across the country speaking out against fast track – and calling on their members of Congress to vote down the bill.

Locally, those lobbying efforts have focused on Sen. Amy Klobuchar. Rep. Betty McCollum, whose district includes the St. Paul, is on record opposing fast track.

Bobby Kasper, president of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, said council members showed their commitment to democracy, transparency and fairness for working people by passing the resolution.

“Fast track paves the road for trade agreements that do more than set tariffs and trade,” Kasper said. “Current proposals in the TPP would allow multinational corporations to challenge local ordinances governing food safety, setting wage and lending standards or establishing ‘buy-local’ procurement policies.

Council Member Chris Tolbert

Council Member Chris Tolbert

“We’re fortunate to have City Council members in St. Paul who share our opposition to fast track, and we’re hopeful other elected officials at the local level will follow their lead.”

Kasper credited Council Member Chris Tolbert for bringing the resolution before the council.

“I am grateful for the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation’s leadership in the fight against fast track, and my colleagues and I were proud to be able to join labor by unanimously supporting opposition to this legislation,” Tolbert said. “This legislation will hurt working families across the country by outsourcing more jobs overseas – good paying jobs that are important for keeping a strong middle class in St. Paul and across the country.”

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Unions back Move MN rally for comprehensive, long-term transportation fix

April 17, 2015 by

MoveMN-signcapitolMarcus Smith would like more reliable bus service from south Minneapolis to his job in St. Paul. Jessica Treat wants dedicated lanes that make bicycling to work safer. James Boney hopes rebuilding and repairing the state’s roads and bridges will mean jobs for workers who need them.

From bicyclists to Building Trades members, public employees to people of faith, more than 300 people brought their concerns and priorities to the Capitol April 16, but they stood shoulder-to-shoulder behind the Move MN coalition’s push for a comprehensive, long-term transportation plan.

Minnesota AFl-CIO President Shar Knutson addresses the Move MN rally.

Minnesota AFl-CIO President Shar Knutson addresses the Move MN rally.

Unions took a leading role in the rally. Minnesota AFL-CIO President Shar Knutson acknowledged the transit workers, road maintenance workers and highway construction workers in the crowd.

“Ask them, and I bet they’ll tell you our transportation system is falling apart,” she said.

More than half of Minnesota’s roads are 50-plus years old, and 40 percent of the state’s bridges are 40-plus years old. The number of roads in poor condition will grow by 74 percent over the next 10 years, as freight traffic statewide is expected to increase by 30 percent.

Gov. Mark Dayton has offered an $11 billion plan to repair state highways, fund local transportation investments and support public transit across Minnesota.

Supporters at the rally said the plan would ease congestion, allow for economic and population growth, and create new jobs – 119,000 of them, according to the governor’s estimates.

Boney, an instructor at Summit Academy OIC, attended the rally with about two dozen participants in the North Minneapolis-based career training program. Wearing safety-yellow vests and hard hats, the trainees, Boney said, will graduate from the program this weekend – and enter the workforce next week.

Summit Academy OIC trainees attended the rally the day before their graduation ceremony.

Summit Academy OIC trainees attended the rally the day before their graduation ceremony.

“This transportation bill could provide more work for students when they graduate, when they go out into the world,” Boney said.

“The best social program in the world is a job,” Summit Academy President Louis J. King II added.

Not only do transportation investments create jobs, but they help people get to and from their jobs, whether by car, bus, bicycle or on foot.

Smith, an AFSCME member who commutes to his job near the Capitol, is among those people. He said the buses he relies on to get to work too often run late.

“We need more buses because they’re congested,” Smith said. “The more crowded the buses are, the slower the process is. Sometimes they’re running 20 or 25 minutes late because it’s so congested.”

Treat, executive director of Women on Bikes, said research shows women are less likely to commute by bicycle – but not for lack of interest.

MoveMN-bicycles“They tell us we want to ride our bikes more, but we don’t feel safe,” she said. Treat urged investments in dedicated bike lanes and paths, noting $1.3 billion worth of bicycle plans in need of funding statewide.

Lawmakers at the rally, including Dayton, House Minority Leader Paul Thissen and Sen. Scott Dibble, warned against attempts to pit greater Minnesota against the Twin Cities, transit needs against road and bridge maintenance or transportation against other budget items.

The only acceptable approach, they said, is a comprehensive, long-term approach.

Thissen said any transportation bill passed by the Legislature should be “the real deal,” and he railed against a House Republican plan to take “money from education and health care to pay for transportation.”

“This is all about our kids and it’s about our grandkids, and it’s about doing what’s best for Minnesota,” Dayton said. “For 25 years we’ve avoided this, and look where we are now. Look at the congestion, look at the deterioration, look at how far behind our public transportation system is.”

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Tellers, teachers, Somali immigrants take on big banks during St. Paul rally

April 14, 2015 by

web.CWA-banks-sceneBeen targeted with a high-pressure sales pitch at your bank recently? You’re not alone, according to a report released earlier this month exposing a “new era of predatory lending” in the industry.

But Wells Fargo employee Michael Lewis offered this plea to frustrated customers yesterday: “The average bank workers, they want to work with you,” he said. “We don’t want to sell you products you don’t need.

“Don’t hate the average worker; hate the banks please.”

And that’s just what activists did during a demonstration downtown St. Paul, outside the Wells Fargo building. Minnesotans for a Fair Economy organized the rally with the Committee for Better Banks, a national organization, backed by the Communications Workers of America and other labor groups, that seeks to improve working conditions at big banks, which raked in more than $100 billion in profits last year.

Marquez asks the public to support bank workers looking to improve their wages and conditions.

Diego Marquez asks the public to support bank workers looking to improve their wages and conditions.

“Every time I see the profit report from these banks – from my bank – I get upset,” bank worker and Better Banks supporter Diego Marquez said. “Why do I have to wear a tie to work and a suit if I can barely make above minimum wage?”

But bank workers like Marquez and Lewis weren’t the only ones with grievances to air against the big banks.

St. Paul Federation of Teachers President Denise Rodriguez called on U.S. Bank and Wells Fargo, which do business with the St. Paul Public Schools, to commit to limiting foreclosures on families that have school-age children during the academic year.

Rodriguez and SPFT member Lily Tharoor, a social worker, described abruptly losing students from their classrooms or school buildings after their families received foreclosure or eviction notices.

“Academically, the kids don’t just stay where they are if they have all these disruptions; they actually fall back,” Tharoor said. “As a member of SPFT, I’m really very proud of the stand the union has taken on this subject. It’s very forward-thinking and really looking out for our students.”

Said Rodriguez: “This is a problem that adults created and that adults can fix.”

Meanwhile, representatives of Somali immigrant groups accused Wells Fargo and other big banks of refusing to work with community leaders on methods for sending financial support – via “remittances” – to family members in East Africa.

New federal regulations prompted U.S. banks to halt money transfers to Somalia in February. They cited concerns remittances might fund terrorism – concerns Sadik Warfa, a local Somali leader, called shortsighted and off the mark.

“I’m a proud American, and the thing is if you stop remittances, you are helping the terrorists because they will tell (people) that America hates us,” Sadik said.

Remittances from Somalis living abroad inject more than $1.2 billion into the country’s economy annually, more than foreign aid and investments combined.

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AFSCME members defend public service during Council 5’s Day on Hill rally

March 25, 2015 by
David Ruth, a mental health worker in Cambridge, calls for safe staffing levels at the state's hospitals and group homes during AFSCME Council 5's Day on the Hill rally.

David Ruth, a mental health worker in Cambridge, calls for safe staffing levels at the state’s hospitals and group homes during AFSCME Council 5’s Day on the Hill rally.

 

“Everyone in this room is an expert in public service,” AFSCME Council 5 Executive Director Eliot Seide told nearly 1,000 members of the union during its Day on the Hill rally yesterday. “You’ve forgotten more than (politicians) will ever know.”

After the rally, held at a downtown St. Paul hotel, union members bused to the Capitol, where they met with their legislators to pitch the union’s priorities this session, including:

• New revenue for a long-term, comprehensive investment in the state’s roads, bridges and transit options.

AFSCME members, MnDOT worker John Gaither said, see the disrepair of the state’s infrastructure every day. “We’re here to tell you the need is urgent,” Gaither said.

• Staffing up for safety at state-run prisons and mental health facilities.

David Ruth, who works at a state facility in Cambridge, listed the injuries AFSCME members have suffered on the job, from sexual assault to being stabbed in the eye with a pen. “We as staff expect some level of danger at our jobs, but we are not willing to risk our lives,” Gaither said.

AFSCME members get fired up during Council 5's Day on the Hill rally.

AFSCME members get fired up during Council 5’s Day on the Hill rally.

Other priorities include reinvesting in public services to support Minnesota’s quality of life, protecting retirement security and defined-benefit pensions and passing the Working Parents Act.

The rally’s theme – “Minnesota Rising!” – played to the difference between Minnesota, where Gov. Mark Dayton and DFL legislators have expanded collective bargaining rights and raised taxes on the wealthiest to protect public services, and other Midwestern states. Any mention of Wisconsin, where Republican presidential hopeful Scott Walker recently signed Right to Work into law, drew jeers from the crowd.

AFSCME Local 8 President Angela Marlow, a child support agent, told members she used to work in Wisconsin; now she works for Ramsey County.

“Remember that bumper sticker that read ‘Escape to Wisconsin?'” Marlow asked. “Well I escaped from Wisconsin to work in Minnesota.”

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Rail union pushes safety measure requiring two-person crews

March 23, 2015 by

UTU_Logo_1A bill that would require two-person crews aboard Amtrak and most freight trains operating in Minnesota passed out of two Senate committees last week. The safety measure is a top legislative priority of the United Transportation Union, which represents about 70,000 workers in North America.

Sen. Ann Rest (DFL-New Hope) introduced the legislation in the Senate, and the measure received bipartisan support in the Judiciary and Transportation committees.

But Republican leaders in the House have refused to take up a companion bill introduced by Rep. Frank Hornstein (DFL-Minneapolis).

UTU Minnesota Legislative Director Phillip Qualy said railroads are lobbying hard against the bill, making false claims that crew-level requirements fall under federal law or under the domain of collective-bargaining agreements – and are outside the Legislature’s jurisdiction.

“Unfortunately, the railroads are misleading the Legislature with inaccurate and erroneous information,” Qualy said.

Carriers are playing a dangerous game. The oil boom in North Dakota’s Bakken region has increased freight-rail traffic in Minnesota, which has the eighth-largest rail network in the U.S.

The timing is right to take a look at the implications that spike in traffic has on public safety, Rest told the Senate Committee on Transportation March 16.

“We know that not only are the derailments becoming an increased concern, but we also know that the number of cars that are used to transport crude oil have exponentially increased in just the last few years,” Rest said.

In testimony before the committee, Qualy characterized requiring the railroads to maintain two-person crews as a matter of “corporate citizenship.”

“The carriers’ practice to remove more and more persons from the right-of-ways of American railroads endangers the general public,” he said.

How? Nick Katich, a trainman for Canadian National Railway in northern Minnesota, offered an example. Increasingly, he said, CN is instructing train operators in Illinois to block public road crossings – a practice he and 200 other members of UTU Local 1067 don’t want to see spread into Minnesota.

“Our standard operation for decades is to get off the locomotive and separate the train at the crossing and leave it open for public and emergency vehicles … until the train is ready to depart,” Katich said. “If there is only one person on a train, there will be no way we can open a crossing.”

Under the proposed legislation, Class I or II carriers would face fines up to $1,000 for operating a one-person crew in Minnesota, unless the carrier is exempted by federal law.

“Our state legislation is not federally preempted and does not contain language that can be construed as a collective-bargaining area,” Qualy said.

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Want a healthier Minnesota? Pass paid sick, family leave policies

March 17, 2015 by
Sen. Katie Sieben (DFL-Newport), a lead offer on legislation to expand access to paid family leave, speaks at a press conference at the Capitol.

Sen. Katie Sieben (DFL-Newport), a lead offer on paid family leave legislation, joins a coalition of workers, faith leaders and business owners working on the issue.

 

Workers shouldn’t have to choose between earning a paycheck and getting medical care, or caring for a newborn child. That’s the essence of labor’s support for legislation that would expand access to earned sick time and paid family leave among Minnesota workers.

But officials with the Minnesota Department of Health today offered another reason for expanding paid leave: a healthier Minnesota.

“Paid sick and family leave is an economic issue, but it is also a public health issue,” MDH Commissioner Edward Ehlinger said at a Capitol press conference, where the department issued a white paper touting the public health benefits of public policies that expand access to sick and family leave.

DFL lawmakers have included such measures in their proposed Working Parents Act, which would mandate the state’s employers offer workers, at minimum, one hour of sick time for every 30 hours on the clock. The bill would also create an insurance program to increase the availability of paid family leave.

Four of 10 workers in Minnesota do not have access to even one paid sick day, according to an analysis released by the Institute for Women’s Policy Research last fall. Just 13 percent of Minnesotans enjoy paid family leave.

Earned sick time and family leave fall even more out of reach for Minnesota’s low-income and part-time workers. The MDH found “significant inequities” that create a “cascading effect on families and entire communities, including children, the elderly and people with disabilities.”

Peggy Flanagan, director of the Children’s Defense Fund-Minnesota, said the report shows communities of color and the state’s American Indian population are hardest hit.

Parents in these communities, already struggling with cyclical poverty, are less likely to take time off to care for a newborn and more likely to send a sick child to school. That creates “an even steeper ladder to success later in life,” Flanagan said.

MNA President Linda Hamilton urges common-sense legislation to guarantee access to earned sick and safe time.

MNA President Linda Hamilton urges common-sense legislation to guarantee access to earned sick and safe time.

It also makes other people sick – another point driven home by the MDH paper.

Minnesotans who lack sick-time benefits often work in jobs that require contact with the public, like food service and health care. The MDH linked at least 208 outbreaks of foodborne illness between 2004 and 2013 to people working while sick, and it attributed 579 disease outbreaks from 2004 to 2011 to “person-to-person transmission in public settings.”

“People who are sick belong home in bed, not in the workplace,” Linda Hamilton, president of the Minnesota Nurses Association, said.

What’s more, workers with access to paid sick leave are more likely to get preventative health care, recover from illnesses faster and reduce the spread of disease. That boosts workers’ productivity in the long-run, Eden Prairie small business owner Verne Severson said.

“I need my employees to be at their best, and employees are at their best when they stay home when sick and they take care of their families,” he said.

Unfortunately, not all employers take the long view, as Minneapolis resident Octancia Adams knows too well.

Commissioner Ehlinger, state lawmakers and others at the press conference listened as Adams recalled being pregnant with her second child eight years ago, when she was working at McDonald’s. The job did not offer paid-sick benefits or paid family leave, and Adams faced a difficult decision when told she would need four to six weeks of rest to recover from a cesarean-section delivery.

Octancia Adams, who returned to work at McDonald's 10 days after having a cesarean section, is now helping lobby for a bill that would expand access to paid family leave.

Octancia Adams, who returned to work at McDonald’s 10 days after having a cesarean section, is now helping lobby for a bill that would expand access to paid family leave.

“I had a choice between returning to work and losing my job,” she said.

Adams chose her job, returning after only 10 days. She’s been paying the price ever since. Adams continues to suffer from a herniated disc and scar tissue that could hemorrhage if she has another child.

“I feel pain every time I ovulate,” she said. “I go back to the doctor, and they tell me there’s nothing more they can do for me.”

Lawmakers can do something to create better options for working mothers, Adams said, so they don’t face the impossible choice she faced eight years ago.

“It shouldn’t be a ‘nice-to-have,’” Flanagan said of paid family leave and earned-sick time. “It should be a must-have.”

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AFL-CIO halts PAC contributions, gears up for battle to stop fast track

March 11, 2015 by

AFLCIOUpping the ante in its campaign to stop trade agreements that give corporations more power over the global economy, the AFL-CIO announced today it would freeze all contributions to federal lawmakers’ Political Action Committees and focus, instead, on a ground battle against fast track for the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

The nation’s largest labor federation announced the freeze, which also applies to its affiliate unions, in a news release today:

The AFL-CIO … and its affiliated unions are freezing all Political Action Committee (PAC) contributions to federal candidates until further notice in order to conserve resources for the historic legislative battle around fast track (trade promotion authority) and the debate over the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

The Council established the defeat of Fast Track as a top federation priority and passed a statement outlining its commitment to fight any trade agreement that fails to prioritize the needs of working families and advance shared prosperity in the global economy.

The AFL-CIO and its affiliates spent $617,771 on PAC contributions in the 2014 election cycle, according to OpenSecrets.org, the Center for Responsive Politics’ website. Most of the federation’s contributions went to Democrats.

The battle over fast track, which would force members to take an up-or-down vote on 1trade agreements without offering amendments, puts the AFL-CIO in the unusual position of opposing the Obama administration.

Looking for common ground with Republicans who took over Congress this year, the White House has moved fast track and the TPP to the top of its agenda. The AFL-CIO’s PAC announcement puts Democratic members of Congress on notice that labor is unwilling to compromise when it comes to supporting a new vision for trade.

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Good Luck: WI health care workers form union on same day Walker signs Right to Work

March 10, 2015 by
Health care workers celebrate their organizing win at United Pioneer Home in Luck, Wis.

Health care workers celebrate their organizing win at United Pioneer Home in Luck, Wis.

More bad news for working families came out of Wisconsin yesterday, when Gov. Scott Walker approved so-called “Right to Work” legislation. But there was good news, too.

Nursing home workers in the small town of Luck, Wis., about 70 miles northeast of the Twin Cities, voted to form a union in election results certified by the National Labor Relations Board yesterday.

As a result, 57 certified nursing assistants, dietary workers, housekeepers and laundry workers at United Pioneer Home now are represented by Local 1189 of the United Food and Commercial Workers, a union headquartered in St. Paul and Duluth.

The organizing drive began in January, after a handful of United Pioneer Home workers approached the union with concerns about insufficient staffing levels and workplace safety. Abraham Wangnoo, director of organizing for Local 1189, said workers reported being afraid to approach management with their concerns and were frustrated with the lack of respect supervisors showed them on the job. One worker who spoke up to management, he said, was dismissed as “just a maid.”

“People wanted a voice,” Wangnoo said. “When they had concerns, they wanted to be heard. This was a way they thought they could use one voice to speak about issues that affect their jobs and the (nursing home) residents’ lives.”

The organizing drive progressed quickly, and workers voted 25-14 in favor of union representation.

Now, United Pioneer Home becomes an early test of whether newly organized unions can survive in post-RTW Wisconsin. The new law allows workers to benefit from a collective bargaining agreement without paying for the cost of representation, making it illegal to collect fair-share fees from workers in an organized workplace who choose not to join the union.

When Local 1189 members and United Pioneer Home agree on a first contract, it will cover all 57 workers eligible to vote in the NLRB election, including those who voted against unionizing. All 57 will enjoy the benefits of the new contract, from grievance procedures and job security to safety protections and compensation increases.

But the cost of negotiating and servicing the new contract will fall entirely on the workers who choose to join the union and pay dues to Local 1189.

By gutting the resources unions rely on to represent workers, RTW generally undermines the appeal – and bargaining power – of organized labor in states that pass the law. But Wangnoo said Local 1189, which represents more than 650 workers in western Wisconsin, isn’t about to pull up stakes.

“We’re going to continue to do the best we can to be the best we can, so people really do see the value in what workers have done in organizing a union,” Wangnoo said. “We want them all to know that it pays to belong.”

That task becomes more difficult over time, as workers active in an organizing effort retire or take other jobs.

Wangnoo said Local 1189’s bargaining units in Wisconsin have elected union stewards who are dedicated to the kind of service and outreach work necessary to bring new members into the fold. Already, some workers who voted against the union at United Pioneer Home have expressed an interest in being involved in negotiations, he said.

“Our representation is what we’re going to count on for keeping the good, strong union density in these places that we need to maintain strong contracts,” he said. “I believe our record will speak for itself, and people will see the value in membership.”

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