For St. Paul city workers, bargaining shifted into high gear after Her took office

February 27, 2026 by

Members of AFSCME locals 1842 and 2508 held informational picketing three years ago during the mayor’s State of the City speech.

Clerical and technical workers at the City of St. Paul ratified new three-year contracts earlier this month after just three bargaining sessions, locking in wage increases that will ensure most union members earn $20 per hour by 2028.

Negotiations between the city and two AFSCME locals, which bargain in tandem on behalf of a combined 1,000 workers, progressed much faster than they did three years ago, when dragged on for six months, sparked informational picketing and required 60 hours with a state mediator.

Two key factors, union leaders said, contributed to the quicker resolution. Workers were fired up from the start to support their bargaining team, and St. Paul voters elected a new mayor, Koahly Her, who sought to get her relationship with city workers off on the right foot.

“Some things we can give the city credit for, and some things we can credit ourselves with doing well,” AFSCME Local 1842 President Isaac Mielke said.

In the end, the new contracts will deliver a $1 across-the-board wage increase April 1 and increases of 3% and 3.5% on Jan. 1 of the next two years. Workers also gained a floating holiday, bereavement leave and a deferred-compensation match.

What’s more, those gains came with no concessions, Local 2508 Treasurer Chelsea Beary said.

“What did we give up? Nothing,” she said. “We took back some of our initial proposals, but the city didn’t add anything. There weren’t any real carveouts or concessions, and we’re really proud of that.”

The relationship between AFSCME – the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees – and city leadership has warmed significantly since last fall, when administrators surprised city workers and their unions with a list of proposed changes to its civil-service rules that they planned to implement by year’s end.

The proposal, which administrators told union leaders they had been working on for about three years, sparked outrage – and action – among AFSCME members, who had already been organizing in opposition to then-Mayor Melvin Carter’s proposed staffing cuts at rec centers and a library.

Locals 1842 and 2508 began gathering support from city unions for a letter to council members opposing the civil-service changes, which would have doubled the probationary period, shortened the timeline for unions to file grievances and lifted guidelines for management in responding to worker complaints, among other changes.

“I think every city local was extremely concerned, and we all hit the ground running, talking to city council members to say this is not how you make these changes,” said Beary, an executive assistant in the Parks Department. “This is something we’re going to negotiate.”

Meanwhile, about 50 AFSCME members showed up to the city’s Truth in Taxation hearing Nov. 25 to oppose the staffing cuts.

“We wanted to do something proactive for these negotiations,” Mielke, a library associate, said. “It turned out, we got a lot of support from community members at that hearing, even people there to talk about other issues. And we won that budget fight.”

Unions won the fight over civil-service rules, too, and they took that momentum into contract talks with the city.

Labor Relations representatives were dismissive, Mielke and Beary said, of AFSCME’s proposals in two bargaining sessions before Carter left office, but that changed in their first – and only – session after Her’s inauguration in January.

“There was an immediate kind of visual change because the city literally brought us donuts,” Beary said. “We met for nine hours, but it became clear as the day went on that the city (representatives) were there to wrap this up.”

After union members voted to ratify the contracts, several members of the bargaining unit who were not signed up as AFSCME members showed their enthusiasm by joining the union, Mielke said.

“Right after we reached the tentative agreement, [Parks and Recreation] had their staff day, and we signed up 11 new members that day alone,” he said. “It’s really exciting.”

– Michael Moore, UA editor

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AFSCME members picket Carter’s State of the City speech

April 19, 2023 by

Members of AFSCME locals 1842 and 2508 picketed outside the Oxford Rec Center.

Clerical and technical workers staged informational picketing outside Mayor Melvin Carter’s State of the City address April 18, putting their frustration over a slow-moving round of contract negotiations on full public display.

“We have felt disrespected at the table,” Como Park horticulturist Bryn Fleming said. “Management has shown up late while we’ve been present. It’s disappointing that this is moving so slowly.”

Fleming is a chief steward with Local 1842 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), representing the city’s technical workers. With the clerical union, AFSCME Local 2508, the unions represent about 1,000 workers in talks that began in December.

AFSCME members’ previous, two-year contracts expired New Year’s Eve, and after six mostly fruitless bargaining sessions, the unions will enter mediation with the city May 8.

Union members’ top priorities in bargaining include 6% annual wage increases, affordable health benefits and safety on the job.

AFSCME members staff the city’s offices, libraries, rec centers and other facilities. Many who work in public-facing positions have described an alarming increase in threatening and violent behavior that leaves them feeling unsafe and understaffed, Fleming said.

“Folks in libraries have experienced assault, verbal abuse,” she said. “For folks in rec centers, it’s the same thing. Safety is a big concern, and we’re really trying to have stronger language on that in our contract. We have seen some movement, but we’d really like to have better collaboration.”

The city’s demands, meanwhile, have included elimination of AFSCME members’ promotional rights, which give union members a first shot at interviewing for certain job openings. Union members also have balked at a proposal to eliminate grievances over civil service violations and, instead, shift the process to a commission controlled by the city.

Those are non-starters for AFSCME’s bargaining team, Local 2508 President Jen Guertin said.

“We are the lowest-paid union members in the city,” she said. “For us to be able to promote up to a higher-wage job, that right to take a test and go to the top of a list for an interview, that’s our career path.”

Members of three unions – the Tri-Council – who work in St. Paul’s parks, public works and water departments ratified a new, three-year contract in March that will raise wages by up to 26%. But they took the city to the brink of a strike to get a deal done.

“We’re not there yet,” Guertin said. “We’re going to try mediation, and I’m hoping for the best but preparing for the worst.”

With a mediator involved, Guertin and Fleming said, talks stand a better chance of starting on time and ending when they stop being productive, if nothing else.

“We would set the meeting to start at 5 p.m., and management wouldn’t come into the meeting until 5:30 or 5:45 – on the regular,” Guertin said. “Then we would pass an offer across the table, and they’d leave us sitting there for six or seven hours before coming back to say we can’t get anything done. What’s the point?”

By picketing the State of the City, union members hoped to put Carter on notice that they’re holding him accountable for the city’s lack of urgency.

“When we say things like we’re scared to go to work or we feel unsafe, we’d like to see somebody do something about that,” Fleming said. “And when we say we can’t pay our bills, we’d like to see somebody pay attention to that.

“I would love to feel like the mayor actually respects the work that we do and respects how difficult it can be.”

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AFSCME members defend public services during annual lobbying day

April 5, 2016 by
Workers who have been injured or assaulted on the job at a state mental health facility stand up during AFSCME Council 5's Day on the Hill rally.

Workers who have been injured or assaulted on the job at a state mental health facility stand up during AFSCME Council 5’s Day on the Hill rally.

 

No one knows more about public services in Minnesota than the workers who deliver them, and state lawmakers had access to an abundance of wisdom today during AFSCME Council 5’s annual lobbying blitz.

“The experts in public service are coming to the Capitol,” Council 5 Director Eliot Seide said at the close of a rally at St. Paul’s RiverCentre. “The legislators better get ready.”

Council 5 of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, which represents 43,000 public-service workers statewide, usually holds its Day on the Hill rally in the Capitol rotunda, but remodeling work has restricted public access to the building this session.

Eliot Seide speaks at AFSCME Council 5's Day on the Hill rally.

Eliot Seide speaks at AFSCME Council 5’s Day on the Hill rally.

Instead, buses shuttled nearly 1,000 union members from RiverCentre to the Capitol after the rally. In meetings with their representatives, AFSCME members pushed several key priorities, including investments in public services and transportation infrastructure.

Gov. Mark Dayton’s proposed budget includes $47 million in Local Government Aid funding to ensure Minnesotans have access to quality public services “no matter where they live,” AFSCME Local 1842 President Koami DaCruz said.

DaCruz, a City of St. Paul employee, said that without LGA, communities “would have to lock up parks and libraries and lay off vital police and firefighters. That’s how they do it in Wisconsin.”

Eric Halverson, a member of AFSCME Local 789 from Morris, urged support for a comprehensive, long-term investment in transportation. Too many Republicans at the Capitol, Halverson said, want to “patch potholes with students and seniors,” citing proposals to cut education and human-services funding in order to spend more on transportation.

AFSCME members also called for a statewide ban on private prisons, student-debt relief, support for public pensions and increased staffing at the state’s mental health facilities.

Local 1842 President Koami DaCruz

Local 1842 President Koami DaCruz

Jackie Spanjers, a member of Local 1307, said assaults on staff have doubled at her workplace, the Anoka Regional Treatment Center. One such attack left her with a torn rotator cuff and ruptured biceps. Dozens of others in the crowd stood up to indicate having suffered similar experiences on the job.

“Hundreds of us are taking a beating inside the mental-health facilities. We feel like punching bags,” Spanjers said. “But we don’t have to suffer in silence anymore. Our union is organizing online and in workplaces to increase staffing levels and change policies so we can be safer at work.”

Council 5’s show of force at the Capitol puts a human face on the work of public service, Local 1092 member Jessica Langhorst said. And in an era of increased attacks on workers – especially public-sector workers – that’s more critical than ever.

“Public workers are not the culprits,” Langhorst said. “We live here. We pay taxes here. We work hard to support our families. We’re not the problem, and we’re not the enemy.”

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