Bobby Kasper: New year offers promise, but only if we stay engaged

January 7, 2019 by

St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Bobby Kasper fired up volunteers during a Labor 2018 door knock in October.

Results of the 2018 midterm election provided plenty of cause for celebration – unless, that is, you’re a CEO or Wall Street banker.

Loud and clear, voters across the country delivered a message that we are tired of corporate control over our government. We are fed up with politicians who hand tax cuts to their wealthy donors while attacking our health care. And we are ready for an agenda that puts working people first.

It’s the message we heard in Dakota, Washington and other counties in the 2nd Congressional District, where labor-endorsed Angie Craig unseated extreme GOP Rep. Jason Lewis. It’s the message we heard statewide, as Minnesota voters overwhelmingly backed Tina Smith and Tim Walz – rejecting divisive, anti-immigrant messages offered up by their opponents – and flipped the state House of Representatives into labor-friendly control.

And it’s the message we heard from our neighbors to the east, as Wisconsin voters finally kicked their union busting governor, Scott Walker, to the curb.

We saw a tidal wave of support last year for pro-worker candidates, many of them union members, women and people of color. But it didn’t happen by accident.

We know the political pendulum doesn’t swing our way unless working people get out there and push it. That’s why at the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, we led an ambitious Labor 2018 campaign to win the political ground game one door at a time in Ramsey, Dakota, Washington and Chisago counties.

The results were historic. Our labor volunteers knocked on more doors and had more conversations than any other labor federation in the state – and nearly three times as many doors as we knocked two years ago, in a presidential cycle! By working together, with support from our affiliate unions, our volunteers helped ensure the labor movement made its presence felt on Election Day. As federation president and a proud LIUNA member, I am grateful to everyone who contributed his or her time to participate in a door knock, phone bank or any other Labor 2018 event.

But the work of building political power for working people did not end Nov. 6. We helped a lot of friends win new House seats in Washington and in St. Paul. Now it’s on us to make sure they remember who their friends are.

For politicians-turned-elected officials, it’s easier to forget than you might think.

Consider the orientation event for freshmen members of Congress hosted on Harvard’s campus last month. A tradition that dates back to the 1970s, it’s billed as an opportunity for newly elected lawmakers to build bipartisanship and ease into their work on Capitol Hill. But here’s the catch: Harvard’s panels and seminars were stacked with CEOs of corporations like General Motors, Boeing and Johnson & Johnson. And the former lawmakers on hand to provide advice? Most now work as lobbyists for pharmaceutical companies, Wall Street and other industry groups.

Several freshman Democrats took offense – and took to social media to pull back the curtain on their so-called orientation. “Lobbyists are here. Goldman Sachs is here,” Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York tweeted. “Where’s labor? Activists? Frontline community leaders?”

As a labor movement, we’re never going to outspend corporate America and the wealthy elites. They will always have more highly paid lobbyists, bigger political action funds and more campaign ads on TV. But here’s what they can’t buy: an engaged, active and powerful movement of people committed to building an economy that works for everyone.

CEOs can whisper into politicians’ ears all they want. It won’t matter if we build and maintain relationships with our allies in the Legislature and in Congress by calling and emailing about issues that matter. The AFL-CIO makes it easy to make our voices heard by signing up for legislative alerts by text message. Or visit our website, http://www.stpaulunions.org, to sign up to get e-activists alerts in your inbox.

Again, I want to thank all the union affiliates that helped us during Labor 2018. Here’s wishing all union members a happy and prosperous new year!

– Bobby Kasper is president of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, representing over 100 affiliate unions with members in Ramsey, Washington, Dakota and Chisago counties.

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Bobby Kasper: Working people can be the difference Nov. 6

November 2, 2018 by

St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Bobby Kasper urges labor volunteers to hit the doors. He’s joined on stage by UFCW Local 1189 officers Jennifer Christensen and Jim Gleb.

The outcome of the Nov. 6 election has the potential to determine our future as union members for at least the next four years.

In Minnesota, we know what’s at stake. We’ve seen the attacks on working people in states around us, and we know those attacks on our freedoms – fended off by Gov. Mark Dayton over the last eight years – will become our reality if Republicans take total control of our state government. Right to work, corporate preemption of our local labor standards, repeal of prevailing wage, attacks on our wages and benefits – they all will find a much more receptive audience with Jeff Johnson in the governor’s office.

Tim Walz is a candidate who will stand for labor and workers’ rights. We live in a time when some people are promoting hate and divisiveness, but that’s not what this election is about. It’s about basic issues – bread-and-butter issues – like our paychecks, our benefits and our freedom to join together and fight for fairness in the workplace.

Tim Walz and our other endorsed candidates – like U.S. Sen. Tina Smith and Angie Craig, running for Congress in Minnesota’s 2nd District, which includes Dakota County – have earned our support by proudly standing with unions, advancing our agenda and speaking up for our members.

We’ve seen what government looks like when politicians ignore the voices of working people and, instead, listen to the whispers of a few CEOs. We get a $1.5 trillion tax cut for corporations and the rich. We get proposed cuts to Medicare and Social Security to pay for their tax scam. We get elected officials who play politics with our health care just to curry favor with some corporate donors. And we get judges who go out of their way to attack our bargaining power at a time of unprecedented income inequality.

We’re tired of it. That’s why we’re changing things by doing what we do best – standing and fighting together.

We’re knocking on doors, making calls and talking at worksites. We’re mobilizing, street-by-street and person-by-person, showing our power and our passion for our issues – the things that affect us every day at our jobs and in our lives. The St. Paul Regional Labor Federation is proud to be the driving force behind what has the makings of the largest and most effective member-to-member political program our state has seen in decades. As a proud member of LIUNA Laborers Local 563, I know these conversations are going to make the difference Nov. 6.

There are three things you can do to help our cause between now and Election Day. First, register and vote. Second, talk to your co-workers about how important it is to vote for candidates who will support our livelihoods. Finally, join our effort to turn out union voters as a volunteer.

– Bobby Kasper is president of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, representing over 100 affiliate unions with more than 50,000 members who live or work in Ramsey, Washington, Dakota and Chisago counties.

Filed Under: Labor Voices Tagged With: , , , , ,

Labor-endorsed Craig fighting to make sure everyone gets a ‘fair shot’

October 30, 2018 by

Angie Craig, the labor-endorsed candidate in Minnesota’s 2nd Congressional District, speaks at a rally with labor volunteers in South St. Paul.

Angie Craig learned the value of a union early in life.

Craig was 9 years old when her mother became the sole provider for Angie and her two siblings. To help them make ends meet, Craig’s grandmother gave up retirement, moved into the mobile-home court where Craig’s family lived, and went back to work.

Angie’s grandmother was 50 at the time. The job she found was in a unionized shoe factory. She was able to keep that job as she grew older, Angie believes, because of the protections of her union contract.

“I can remember on two occasions that her union rep went in with her and talked to management, and it saved her job,” Craig said. “I grew up with a very distinct feeling that a union had helped my family survive.”

Now, as Craig makes her second bid for Congress in Minnesota’s 2nd District, unions have her back again. She has earned the endorsement of the state’s largest labor federation, the Minnesota AFL-CIO, as someone who will stick up for working people and protect their freedom to join together.

UA: What can Congress do to get more people into union jobs?

AC: What businesses tell me they are lacking are people with career skills and technical skills. I want to see us rethink vocational-technical education in this country, and that would include these first-class apprenticeship programs that labor unions and their employers have developed. I’d like to make sure that young people understand these apprenticeship programs are available to everyone.

The other thing that I think the Congress should do – and this is what really differentiates me from my opponent massively – is I think we should amend Taft-Hartley to make right-to-work laws illegal in this country.

UA: Income inequality is already at historic levels, and it’s only rising, thanks to the $1.5 trillion tax cut for corporations and the wealthy, which your opponent, Jason Lewis, backed. If you could go back do things differently, what would you do?

AC: I want to go back and do what we should have done in the first place, and that is focus on giving the middle class and working Americans a tax break. We’ve given over a trillion dollars away to large corporations – and at the same time we didn’t close tax loopholes that allow them to send jobs overseas. And now they’re talking about cutting Medicare and Social Security to pay for it.

UA: When it comes to health care, President Trump and Congressional Republicans, including your opponent, seem interested only in creating chaos and uncertainty for families seeking coverage. What approach would you take to health care policy?

AC: The first thing we need to do is to take on big drug companies and take on these health insurance companies. If we really wanted to control costs, we would be negotiating drug prices with Medicare. We would offer more competition into the marketplace, and we’d give consumers another choice by allowing them to choose to buy into a program like Medicare and compete with the large health insurance companies. But instead of taking on any of these special interests, the Republican-controlled Congress and the President have continued to just chip away at the current health care law for political purposes…

UA: Women voters appear to be especially energized this year. How can Congress make sure women who speak up about harassment, including at work, are heard?

AC: As the head of human resources for a Minnesota manufacturer, my team and I carried out investigations of harassment in the work place. In order for this moment to last, it’s important to strike the right balance between due process – including full, fair, and thorough investigations for the accused – with equal protection for everyone. Labor has led the way forward on forging the workplace protections Americans enjoy today, and I will work with our union brothers and sisters to continue strengthening them for everyone.

UA: It’s your second run in a district that hasn’t elected a DFLer in nearly two decades. What gives you hope this year is different? What keeps you in this fight?

AC: At the end of the day, I grew up in a family that had to work our ass off to get ahead, and that’s what I want to go fight for – to make sure that if you’re willing to work hard in this country, this country is fair to you and you have a fair shot to get ahead. That’s going to be my focus as a member of Congress. I grew up in a mobile home court, worked two jobs to put myself through school. I’ve got four boys, three of them are out of the house, two in college, one in trade school. I’m going to be fighting so that no matter how much money you were born into, you get a fair shot.

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Enthusiasm high among labor volunteers as Election Day nears

October 29, 2018 by

Labor 2018 volunteers pack UFCW Local 1189’s union hall in South St. Paul for a rally before knocking doors in the East Metro.

With the finish line in sight, national union leaders and labor-endorsed candidates fired up union volunteers Saturday in South St. Paul, urging them to keep working to turn out labor voters for the midterm election Nov. 6.

“We’ve got 10 days until the day that will determine the direction of our nation,” AFSCME Secretary-Treasurer Elissa McBride told over 150 people ready to knock doors in St. Paul and nearby suburbs. “We’ve got a lot of work to do.”

McBride was one of two national labor leaders who traveled to Minnesota for the weekend campaign push. Political strategists are closely watching congressional races here that could be pivotal in determining control of Congress for the next two years.

“The reason we came in from Washington, D.C. is because all eyes are on Minnesota right now,” AFL-CIO Secretary Treasurer Liz Shuler, the nation’s second highest ranking labor leader, said.

Keith Ellison, the labor-endorsed candidate for attorney general in Minnesota, gets backing from AFL-CIO Secretary Treasurer Liz Shuler.
St. Paul Regional Labor Federation President Bobby Kasper fired up volunteers during a Labor 2018 door knock in October.
A volunteer captures remarks by labor-endorsed lieutenant governor candidate Peggy Flanagan on video.
Angie Craig, the labor-endorsed candidate in Minnesota’s 2nd Congressional District, speaks at a rally with labor volunteers in South St. Paul.
AFSCME volunteer Sheila Pokorny lets out a cheer.

 

Several candidates running with labor support in key races joined the rally.

U.S. Sen. Tina Smith is running to keep the seat she’s held since being appointed by Gov. Mark Dayton to replace Al Franken. Smith thanked union volunteers for getting more voters to the polls.

“We have a job to do in this democracy, and that is to participate,” she said.

Angie Craig is running “to make Jason Lewis a one-term congressman,” she said, in Minnesota’s 2nd Congressional District. Craig lost the third-closest U.S. House race in the country two years ago. She scored a standing ovation from volunteers when she said Congress should amend federal labor law to make right to work illegal.

“If you want to make America great again, you make unions great again in this country,” she said.

Both Smith and Craig are getting a boost from the Labor 2018 campaign, which has union volunteers reaching out to working Minnesotans at their front doors, on their phones and on social media. Since August, volunteers with the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation – just one of six regional labor bodies in the state – have attempted over 80,000 direct contacts with union members, retirees or their family members.

Labor 2018 is the most ambitious political push the state’s unions have ever attempted, and it’s tapping into enthusiasm among union activists, women voters and others who have had Nov. 6, 2018, circled on their calendars since Trump took office.

The Labor 2018 campaign’s top priority is electing Tim Walz governor. Walz’s running mate, state Rep. Peggy Flanagan, attended the rally, hosted by United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1189.

“Let’s be the wave for Walz,” McBride urged volunteers. “Let’s be the workers’ wave, the women’s wave.”

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

To stop cycle of cuts, St. Paul educators back levy referendum

October 25, 2018 by

spps-levy-logoJust months after emerging from a fractious round of contract negotiations, St. Paul educators, board members and administrators are pulling in the same direction this fall, urging voters to approve an operating levy worth an additional $18.6 million in annual school funding for the district.

The new funds would help the St. Paul Public Schools address revenue shortfalls that have forced over $50 million in programming, staff and other budget cuts over the last three years. This school year, the district shaved an additional $17.2 million from its budget.

A number of factors outside the district’s control have contributed to the budget woes, but the biggest factor, district leaders say, is the state government’s per-pupil funding formula hasn’t kept pace with rising education costs. Mandated special education services, for example, cost the district $42 million more annually than the funding it receives to provide those services.

With so much uncertainty, SPPS Superintendent Joe Gothard said the levy increase would provide the district with greater budget stability, freeing schools and educators to focus less on where to cut and more on the students they serve.

“We have great work happening every day in our schools, but it is a challenge to sustain our efforts,” Gothard said. “We see this levy as a investment in making sure St. Paul continues to be a great place to live, work and learn.”

Members of the St. Paul educators’ union began mobilizing in support of the levy as the new school year began, pursuing an ambitious plan to knock the door of every educator living in the district. Beth Swanberg, a music teacher at Highland Park Middle School, said her conversations at the doors have been positive.

“People in St. Paul are supportive of public schools,” Swanberg said. “There is a history of quality education here, and people have told me they want to continue that.”

A game of ‘what if?’

Indeed, the stakes are high for students, parents and educators. Long gone are the days when districts like St. Paul went to voters with levy requests to fund the extras that might enrich their schools’ programming.

“Now we’re trying to do a levy referendum to make up for the cuts that have come down from our state Legislature,” union president Nick Faber said.

Last month the North Star Policy Institute unveiled a new report, “Minnesota Backslide,” that charts the decline in state funding to local school districts. Researchers found 93 percent of school districts statewide are receiving less aid today, in inflation-adjusted dollars, than in 2003, when state lawmakers overhauled the school funding system. In half of districts statewide, state funding has dropped by more than 10 percent.

The state’s failure to keep school funding steady has forced most school districts to seek property-tax levies to bridge the gap.

St. Paul is no exception. If state funding had kept up with inflation over the past 15 years, SPPS would have received nearly $620 more per student this year. That’s a total of $21.6 million in lost funds – a number that leaves a lot of educators wondering “what if?”

“If we could actually start to recoup the funding that we’ve lost over the last 20 years and have that referendum on top of it, imagine the things that we could do,” Faber said. “With the knowledge that our educators have here in St. Paul, with their willingness to tackle racial equity head on, we could accomplish so much with that kind of funding.”

“I often wonder what I would request for my students if we had more funds, and it’s hard to even imagine because I’m so used to not having any extras,” Highland Park Middle School teacher Leah VanDassor said. “It’s been so many years of cuts, cuts, cuts at every level.”

VanDassor, Swanberg and other St. Paul educators aren’t just talking with voters about the levy. They are also trying to paint the bigger picture, urging support for labor-endorsed candidates at the top of the ballot who will reinvest in public schools. That includes Tim Walz, the labor-endorsed candidate for governor.

But VanDassor acknowledged “any fundamental change will not be fast,” and the immediate needs of her students are great.

Trusting the voters

The levy campaign has broad support from the community. The St. Paul Regional Labor Federation has endorsed it, and so has St. Paul Mayor Melvin Carter, who called SPPS the “lifeblood” of his community.

Only a year removed from campaigning citywide for the mayor’s office, Carter said he has faith people living in the school district will join him in voting “yes.” The investment, Carter added, goes hand in hand with his administration’s work to realign city programming to meet the needs of St. Paul’s changing population – and include more voices.

“We’re not just going to say we can do more for our children,” he said. “We’re actually going to do more for our children.

“I’m confident the city will step forward.”

Filed Under: Community, Politics Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,

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.”

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

Workers trust Ellison to have their back as AG

October 11, 2018 by
43703342_10156668594436870_3312592989892640768_n

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.”

Filed Under: Labor Voices, Politics Tagged With: , , , ,

Retiree Council president: ‘You can’t just ride off into the sunset’

October 4, 2018 by

Ken McInnis

Ken McInnis has been going to union meetings since he was 5 years old. He helped organize a union when he was 15.

It’s no surprise, then, that his union activism has extended into retirement.

A former diesel mechanic and longtime member of Machinists Local Lodge 737, McInnis became president of the Minnesota State Retiree Council last month, when Bill Moore resigned after seven years in the position.

“My dad was a pulp and paper worker, and my mother used to send me with him to his union meetings when I was 5, 6 and 7 years old,” McInnis said. “When I was 15, I was working at a SuperValu store in Eau Claire, and we were lucky enough to organize a union.”

For McInnis, who now lives in Ham Lake, it was the start of a lifetime of support for the labor movement and progressive causes. In between jobs as a mechanic, he worked over 12 years as a business representative for Machinists District Lodge 77. He’s run for state and federal office, held several positions in the DFL Party and served alongside Paul Wellstone in Minnesota’s delegation to the Democratic National Committee.

His latest challenge? Providing direction for the Retiree Council, which provides Minnesota’s union retirees and their organizations with a voice in the state’s labor movement – and an opportunity to remain active in advocating for public policy and political representation that advances their interests.

UA: You took office at the start of a pivotal campaign season. Has it been a baptism by fire?

KM: It’s more work, obviously, in an election year, but it’s work I’m familiar with. I previously ran for state House and state Senate as a labor-endorsed DFLer here in Ham Lake. It’s a district that had about a 37 percent DFL index. I got 39 percent of the vote, so I figure I did alright.

So the election work is not a trial by fire. We’ve also got a lot of programs that we’re working with here, and we’re working to see that retirees have their say.

But for me, I’ve done this stuff for 40 years. It’s nothing new, just a different venue.

UA: What’s driven that interest in organizing and campaign work over four decades and counting?

KM: The old adage is, ‘The world is run by those that come to the meeting.’ I’ve always gone to the meetings.

Looking at the importance of the issues that are before us right now, those issues haven’t really changed a whole lot since I got involved back in 1973. We’re still fighting ‘right to work for less.’ We’re still fighting to make sure Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid are going to be there for future retirees, like my three granddaughters. Those are the issues that drive me.

UA: You’re a self-starter when it comes to politics. How do you hope to inspire a similar interest among other retirees?

KM: I’ve always said if I’m lucky enough to engender an interest by one person per year, I’ll feel lucky. But it’s also about walking the walk. If I’m not going to do the work, other retirees are going to look at me and say, ‘He wants us to do it, but he won’t do it himself.’

UA: Where do you hope to see the Retiree Council go as an organization during your time in the president’s office?

KM: Right now we’re keyed in on making sure we win on Nov. 6. That’s the most important thing because if we don’t win, workers in general are going to lose their ability to better their lot.

Beyond that, my plan is to work on organizing the retiree networks out there. Not every union has a retiree chapter. Many have chapters that are more of a social club than an advocacy group. Hopefully we can engage some of them – and we have been – to participate in the council and in the Minnesota AFL-CIO.

It’s important for retirees to understand that you can’t just walk off into the sunset and think that everything’s going to be covered. Greedy people out there – including the party that controls Congress and the President himself – are trying to take everything away from us that they can, like pensions, Medicare, Social Security, our rights.

I’m issuing a call for retirees or organizations that have retirees to get active and put together a retiree organization if they don’t already have one. Join us; join our work. If everybody does a little bit, then a whole lot will get done.

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Bobby Kasper: Our movement is on the rise, but we can’t stop now

August 31, 2018 by

Bobby Kasper

(Bobby Kasper is president of the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, AFL-CIO, which represents more than 100 affiliate unions with over 50,000 members living or working in Ramsey, Washington, Dakota and Chisago counties.)

Labor Day marks the unofficial end of summer in Minnesota. But at the St. Paul Regional Labor Federation, it’s the beginning of an all-out push to elect candidates who share our vision for a fair and just economy.

It’s important work – this year more than ever before – and we can’t do it alone. We need union members and retirees like you to get involved as Labor 2018 volunteers.

How will our volunteers make a difference? By doing what organizers do best: talking to each other. Our volunteers reach out to fellow working people by phone and at the door, and remind them how much is at stake this year, from our paychecks and benefits to our basic dignity on the job.

Working people have the power to create the fair economy we deserve, and right now is the perfect opportunity to put our power to work. Why now? Because something is happening in America.

Our movement is on the rise.

As a wave of collective action sweeps the country, working people are standing together to demand what we deserve. We are marching and striking and organizing. We are refusing to accept business as usual.

For too long now, corporations have tried to keep us weak and divided. They have rigged the economy to work for the few at the expense of the many. They have tried to destroy our unions and pit us against each other. And too many of America’s leaders have done their bidding, waging an assault on our most fundamental freedoms.

As a result, the wealth of a few corporate elites continues to reach unprecedented heights, while working people are left out of the immense prosperity we create every day. CEOs now earn 361 times the average worker, and we still are denied the wages, health care retirement security and quality of life that we have earned.

Rather than taking action to unrig our economy, too many politicians in Washington are only interested in making it worse. Look no further than the tax scam passed this year by President Trump and congressional Republicans, including our own Jason Lewis. They promised these cuts, targeted overwhelmingly toward corporations and the rich, would lead to raises for workers like us. Instead, we’re seeing corporations reward their executives and buy back their own stock.

Of course, as union members we have never looked to corporations or politicians to validate our movement. The rights of working people have always been won and sustained by our own desire and passion for change.

Our power lies in the hundreds of thousands of workers carrying new union cards – three-quarters of them younger than 35. It lies in the tens of millions more who would vote today to join a union if given the chance. Our movement’s capacity for change lies in the workers across the country who are standing together, marching together and fighting together, arms locked in unflinching solidarity.

The midterm elections present the next critical opportunity to secure a brighter future. We can reverse course and start building an America that works for all of us by winning on Nov. 6.

We have the power to create the fair economy and just society that we deserve. And that means making our voices heard loud and clear on the campaign trail – and, in the process, electing labor-endorsed candidates like Tim Walz for governor. We are mobilizing locally to defeat corporate-backed politicians and fill the halls of power with genuine allies of working families. Victory in November will be delivered by conversations between friends, family and co-workers. More than anyone, you have the ability to win hearts and minds and ensure that working people have a say in the future of our country.

Are you ready to make history? Find a volunteer shift that works for you, or call us at 651-222-3787. Let’s put the power of working people on full display this election season.

Have a great Labor Day!

Filed Under: Labor Voices Tagged With: , , , ,

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.

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