Bobby Kasper: Super Bowl will showcase union workers

May 29, 2014 by
Bobby Kasper

Bobby Kasper

It doesn’t take most people very long to realize I’m not a native Minnesotan. My New York accent is usually a dead giveaway. But after living here for 20-plus years, Minnesota is the place I’m proud to call home. That’s why I was thrilled to learn the Twin Cities will play host to Super Bowl LII in 2018. The biggest sporting event on U.S. soil is our opportunity to show off to the world the multitude of reasons Minnesota is a great place to live.

The Super Bowl will be a showcase for the work Minnesota’s union members do every day to make Minnesota the “quality-of-life state” it is. Just think of the many ways union workers will be on the front lines of the effort to showcase Minnesota to the rest of the world.

Our hospitality workers will be the first point of contact for the 100,000-plus visitors expected to descend on the region for the Super Bowl, including fans, media members and industry professionals. Members of UNITE HERE, the hospitality workers’ union, can be counted on to provide visitors with professional service in our hotels, bars and restaurants.

Members of Building Trades unions, of course, will have built the stadium in which the Super Bowl will be played, and members of the Service Employees International Union will keep it clean. Stagehands, members of IATSE Local 13, will ensure the circus of events leading up to the big game goes off without a hitch. Bus drivers and train operators, members of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1005, will see that visitors get to all of their destinations safely, conveniently and on time.

Our public employees, members of AFSCME, will help the Twin Cities region roll out the welcome mat, readying our infrastructure, making our parks and public building shine, and plowing the snow and ice from our roads and bridges if necessary.

Speaking of ice, it’s rumored that our brothers and sisters in the Building Trades will once again tackle the tall task of building an eight-story Ice Palace in St. Paul. Nothing has been confirmed yet, but the palace could go up during Winter Carnival and remain for the Super Bowl. Volunteers from the Building Trades constructed the world’s largest ice castle the last time the Super Bowl came to Minnesota, in 1992.

So regardless of whether you’re a football fan or not, as Minnesotans we have plenty of reasons to be excited about Super Bowl LII coming to town. Sure, it will be cold. And yes, it will be crowded. But if we put our best foot forward – and with union members on the job, I’m confident we will – the Super Bowl has the potential to attract more visitors, more conventions and more big events to our region down the road. That’s good for hospitality workers, good for our local economy and good for tax revenues.

– Bobby Kasper is president of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, with more than 150 affiliate unions representing more than 50,000 union members in the East Metro.

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Transit workers enlist riders in fight for better public transportation

May 20, 2014 by
Metro Transit GM Brian Lamb speaks during the "Transit Tuesday" rally, which took place next to the Government Plaza light-rail stop.

Metro Transit GM Brian Lamb speaks during the “Transit Tuesday” rally, staged next to the Government Plaza light-rail stop.

It’s Transit Action Month nationwide, and Metro Transit workers and riders took action today downtown Minneapolis, calling for “more, better and safer public transit” during a lunchtime rally outside the Hennepin County Government Center.

Coordinated by Local 1005 of the Amalgamated Transit Union (ATU), the “Transit Tuesday” event drummed up support for a bipartisan bill making its way through Congress that would reauthorize federal funding for the nation’s highways and mass transit systems.

Brian Lamb, general manager of Metro Transit, called the transportation bill a key source of funding as his organization scrambles to meet the transit needs of a region expected to see its population grow by 850,000 in the next 25 years.

web.ATUrally-signs“We need to you to contact your representatives and let them know how important this is,” Lamb urged people at the rally. “Help them to know how strong the support for this is back home.”

Transit Action Month events nationwide are part of the ATU’s effort to enlist riders and other transit advocates in the political struggle for increased transit investment.

“We want our riders to know we stand with them in the fight for more, better and safer public transit,” Local 1005 Vice President Dorothy Maki said. “Together we can ensure that our voices are heard and elected officials understand that we want them to stand up for transit.”

[Tell your representatives in Congress you support more funding for public transit. Click here to find the phone number for your representatives in the House and Senate.]

The partnership between transit operators and riders is critical at the state level, as well as in Congress. Transit advocates’ efforts to secure more stable funding from the State of Minnesota, including a three-fourth cent sales tax dedicated to transit, came up short in both the 2013 and 2014 legislative sessions.

Reliable, efficient transit service is key to ensuring economic development benefits all communities, said Robert Lilligren, who chairs the Native American Community Development Institute. Living in the Phillips neighborhood of Minneapolis, Lilligren said the first question many of his neighbors ask when they see an employment opportunity is whether it’s accessible by bus.

“If the answer is no, then we are not only robbing that individual of a job or training opportunity, but we are robbing that business of a potential employee,” Lilligren said.

Many speakers at the “Transit Tuesday” rally urged riders and operators to make transit funding an issue during the 2014 election season, which will determine the makeup of the Minnesota House of Representatives.

Last year Metro Transit provided 81 million rides – each one “an opportunity for connecting drivers and riders to advocate for better transit,” said Jennifer Munt, a member of the Met Council, which operates Metro Transit.

“If we don’t make transit a campaign issue in 2014, it won’t be on the agenda come 2015,” added Margaret Donahoe, director of the Minnesota Transportation Alliance.

There were some victories for public transit at the Capitol in 2014, Rep. Frank Hornstein said. The DFLer from Minneapolis pointed to a $500,000 investment in transit shelters and creation of a rapid-transit line along Snelling Avenue in St. Paul.

“With your organizing, we’re going to do even better in 2015,” Hornstein said.

“Bus drivers every day connect people to work, to school, to their dreams. They connect people to a better life. There is dignity in that work," Met Council Member Jennifer Munt said. Munt also works as Communications Director for AFSCME Council 5.

“Bus drivers every day connect people to work, to school, to their dreams. They connect people to a better life. There is dignity in that work,” Met Council Member Jennifer Munt said. Munt also works as Communications Director for AFSCME Council 5.

Filed Under: Politics, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , ,

A stinging defeat on labor relations bill 75 years ago

April 3, 2014 by
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Transit workers ended their 44-day strike 10 years ago this month, after 72 percent of voting ATU Local 1005 members ratified a new contract with Metro Transit. Above: 6-year-old Nicholas Wagner attended his first union rally three days before the settlement.

The Minnesota Federation of Labor held an emergency special convention for the first time in its history April 3, 1939. On the agenda? How to defeat a labor-relations bill making its way through the Legislature that winter and considered by The Advocate to be “one of the most vicious anti-Labor bills ever introduced in the middle west.”

Known as the Vance-Myre bill, the measure reclassified some unfair labor practices as “unlawful acts,” making them misdemeanors punishable by up to 90 days in jail.

The bill’s opponents, including Rep. John Barrett, a member of St. Paul Steamfitters Local 455, called it an overreaction meant to “restrict the entire Labor movement for the overt acts of a few individuals or groups within the Labor movement.”

The measure passed on the final day of the legislative session, despite opposition from unions and lawmakers like Barrett.

“We should have left out any reference to unfair practices or unlawful acts leaving those exceptional situations to be dealt with under criminal code where they belong,” Barrett said.

[The Union Advocate’s “This Month in the Archives” feature offers a look back at what the newspaper was reporting from 5 to 100 years ago. Our digital archives are online, searchable and free to anyone. Click here for access.]

50 Years Ago: Hospitals stonewalled health workers

Gov. Karl Rolvaag named an impartial arbiter in April 1964 to help settle a dispute between five St. Paul hospitals and members of Hospital Employees Local 113, a forerunner of today’s SEIU Healthcare Minnesota.

By April 1964, the hospitals had been dragging their feet in contract negotiations with the union for 13 months. State law denied hospital employees, as well as state and local government workers, the right to strike – meaning Local 113 members’ options for taking action against the hospitals were limited.

“Most unions would call a strike,” The Advocate reported in its April 9 edition, but the “poor substitute” left for hospital employees was to seek arbitration, a move they made after a meeting the month before with hospital management broke down.

R.A. Olson, president of the Minnesota Federation of Labor, said the situation revealed a need to change the state’s laws to empower hospital workers and public employees with a full complement of rights on the job.

“They are forbidden to strike and are given nothing in exchange for their loss of rights,” Olson said.

25 Years Ago: Nursing home workers aired grievances

In a meeting with two members of the Minnesota Senate Finance Committee, about 80 nursing home workers, members of United Food and Commercial Workers, warned that low pay, poor benefits and threadbare staffing were eroding the quality of care in their facilities.

The meeting was organized by the Labor-Management Coalition for Quality Health Care.

One worker told senators she quit her nursing assistant job of nine years even though it meant a $2 per hour pay cut. “I couldn’t take it any more,” she said, noting workers often were assigned 15 to 20 patients at a time.

Sen. Don Samuelson told workers he didn’t anticipate a funding increase for nursing homes during the 1989 legislative session. The Legislature provided for a one-time, 3.5 percent increase in the previous budget, hoping nursing home operators would pass on the influx to workers.

But many of the non-union nursing homes “used it for workers’ compensation premium increases,” so many workers didn’t see a penny, he said.

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Republican governor blasted ‘right to work’ legislation 50 years ago

February 1, 2013 by

Fifty years ago, to the surprise of Minnesota’s labor community, Republican Gov. Elmer Anderson offered his opposition to a lethal brand of anti-union legislation unions are still fighting today.

The Feb. 14, 1963, issue of The Union Advocate reported Anderson had issued a statement saying he would veto any “compulsory open shop legislation, which usually masquerades as a ‘right-to-work’ bill.”

Although the Republicans controlled both the House and the Senate in Minnesota, RTW had not emerged as part of the party’s agenda, and Anderson issued the statement – reported by mainstream media as well as the labor press – in response to a written inquiry from the business manager of Office and Professional Employees Local 12.

“Clearly and unequivocally I oppose ‘right-to-work’ legislation … I do not know any plainer or clearer way to say it,” Anderson said. “My reason is that I do not believe it would aid labor relations in our state but would weaken the Labor Movement and cause friction between Management and Labor and cause difficulties within Organized Labor where there would be some workers wanting a free ride.”

[The Union Advocate’s “This Month in the Archives” feature offers a look back at what the newspaper was reporting from 5 to 100 years ago. Our digital archives are online, searchable and free to anyone. Click here for access.]

100 Years Ago: A better Legislature, better results

OK, so it only feels like it’s been 100 years since state lawmakers took up an agenda on behalf of Minnesota’s working families. But that was, in fact, the case during the 1913 legislative session, according to the Feb. 14 Union Advocate:

“It is particularly pleasing to note that bills in the interest of labor are given close and careful attention with a view to securing the best results,” The Advocate reported.

Bills the labor press monitored closely that year included legislation to require one day of rest per week for workers in factories, workshops or mercantile establishments (workers caring for live animals or maintaining fires were exempted).

Several bills concerning workplace safety progressed through the Legislature: one requiring employers to report accidents to the state, one requiring physicians to report cases of lead poisoning, and another requiring railroads to equip locomotives with “suitable and proper” headlights.

75 Years Ago: Two-day streetcar and bus strike ended

Thirty-five motormen and conductors refused to take their streetcars out of the barn Feb. 14, 1938, after management abruptly announced it was eliminating one of two paid positions aboard the Fort Snelling-Plymouth-Minnehaha streetcar line.

The Monday-morning strike spread quickly among transit workers throughout the Twin Cities, grinding bus and streetcar service to a halt.

The strike lasted until the following evening, when members of Local 1005 of the Amalgamated Association of Street and Electric Railway and Motor Coach Employees of America – today’s Amalgamated Transit Workers union – voted 754 to 167 to end the work stoppage.

The Union Advocate called the strike a win for transit workers in its Feb. 17 edition, noting that the company agreed to restore two-man service to streetcars – and provide 30-days notice “in the event the company decides to change any two-man car operation to one-man operation.”

Wednesday morning’s commute, meanwhile, was smooth sailing.

“At 11 p.m. Tuesday the strike was off,” The Advocate reported. “Motormen, conductors and bus drivers were at their stations waiting word of the settlement and the service was resumed immediately.”

AFSCME Local 3800 staged a demonstration during the installation of new U of M President Robert Bruininks in February 2003.

AFSCME Local 3800 staged a demonstration during the installation of new U of M President Robert Bruininks in February 2003.

10 Years Ago: AFSCME members spotted trend in U funding

Clerical workers at the University of Minnesota spotted a disturbing trend ten years ago: public disinvestment in the state’s land-grant university. And the workers, members of AFSCME Local 3800, put the blame squarely on Republican Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

In an action organized by the local, 100 demonstrators greeted faculty and administrators as they processed in ceremonial garb to view the installation of new president Robert Bruininks Feb. 28, 2003, The Advocate reported.

The demonstrators “mostly stood quietly, carrying signs saying ‘Save Public Education’ and ‘Support Public Service.’ They distributed fliers protesting Gov. Tim Pawlenty’s budget policies, which include slashing $185 million in funding to the university.”

The cuts, of course, have only grown worse. The U’s $1.18 billion budget request for 2014-15, presented to lawmakers last month, represents about the same level of state funding the U received in 2001.

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Metro Transit workers say contract talks are running behind schedule

September 13, 2012 by

Members of ATU Local 1005 pack the gallery at last night’s Met Council meeting.

Fed up with Metro Transit’s casual approach to negotiating a new contract, members of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1005 shared their frustration yesterday with Metro Transit’s governing body, the Met Council.

Carrying homemade signs and wearing their Metro Transit uniforms, about 30 members of ATU Local 1005 packed the gallery during the Met Council’s meeting downtown St. Paul. Their message to council members was clear: Get Metro Transit to bargain in good faith.

The Twin Cities’ regional public transportation service, Metro Transit is a division of the Met Council, a 17-member board appointed by the governor. Metro Transit employs about 2,200 members of ATU Local 1005.

The previous contract between Local 1005 and Metro Transit expired July 31. Negotiations on a new agreement began in May, but the two sides have made little progress, particularly when it comes to major issues like wages, health care benefits and work rules.

Local 1005 President Michelle Sommers accused Metro Transit management of dragging its feet.

“We haven’t made any progress to speak of on a new contract,” she said. “They have not even given us health care numbers, let alone a wage package yet.”

ATU Local 1005 members agreed to a two-year wage freeze during negotiations on their last contract – a bone of contention after management jobs swelled.

Unfortunately, that’s business as usual for Metro Transit. Two years ago the agency dragged out its last round of negotiations with Local 1005, finally settling nine months after the previous contract had expired.

The two sides have a history of contentious labor relations. Local 1005 members staged a six-week strike in 2004, nine years after an 18-day strike at Metro Transit.

Union members agreed to a two-year wage freeze in their last contract, but have been angered by Metro Transit’s decision to hire more people for management positions since then.

Sommers said Metro Transit administrators foster a culture of disrespect among management for front-line workers – something union members hope to address in negotiations on a new contract.

“It’s about day-to-day equality and respect,” she said. “They are very, very disrespectful to employees here. Their approach is to manage by fear, and that’s a major focus of ours in getting a contract done.”

Filed Under: Organizing, Union Events Tagged With: , , , , ,
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