Workers Have Had Enough—Thousands Took to the Streets in Week of Action

by James Parks, Jul 14, 2006

Did you hear it? Did you feel it? This week, workers across the country showed a renewed and determined spirit to turn the nation’s political policies around, beginning with the anti-worker decisions of the Bush-appointed National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

In 21 cities, workers took to the streets in a week of action to protest the NLRB’s failure to do its job and protect workers’ freedom to join a union.

Earlier this week in Nashville, workers carried giant papier mâche Q-tips and urged the NLRB to “clean out your ears and hear workers.” In Washington, D.C., yesterday, 1,500 workers cheered in support of nine union and religious leaders who blocked traffic at NLRB headquarters.

Stewart Acuff, the AFL-CIO’s organizing director and one of the nine who blocked the busy downtown D.C. street, summed up the power of the week of action this way:

George Bush is the most anti-worker president in decades and this is the most anti-worker, anti-collective bargaining NLRB in its 71-year history. It’s time to stop them.

The week of actions focused on a series of cases now before the NLRB known as “Kentucky River,” in which the NLRB soon will decide whether many nurses, building and construction trades workers, journalists and others should be classified as “supervisors.” If the NLRB expands the definition of supervisor to include such workers, an estimated 8 million workers no longer will have the federally protected right to form a union.

Despite the far-reaching consequences of tbese decisions, the NLRB has refused to hear oral arguments and has denied union requests to hear oral arguments in these cases. You can act now and contact your members of Congress to tell Bush’s labor board to reverse its decision and allow oral arguments in the “Kentucky River” cases.

In other week of action events:

• In Portland, Ore., Gov. Ted Kulongoski (D) joined workers yesterday to deliver a petition calling for oral arguments signed by hundreds of union members to the local office of the NLRB. They also delivered a large letter signed by several Congress members from Oregon.
• More than 400 workers in Oakland, Calif., wearing red T-shirts with photos of three nurses flexing their muscles, marched with signs that read, “Bush NLRB: Hands Off Our Rights.” They sang songs with lyrics such as “We Need Justice in the White House Now.”
• In Chicago, 300 nurses from a wide range of unions, marched through the city’s financial district yesterday to counter what one organizer called the “right-wing, conservative NLRB.”
• In Nashville, after marching with the giant Q-tips, the 250 workers presented the NLRB regional director with 100 signed letters asking for oral arguments in the Kentucky River cases on July 12.
• In Pittsburgh, 250 workers filled a downtown street July 12 to protest the disastrous outcome if the NLRB issues an unfavorable decision. “This decision has the potential to devastate the nursing profession in the United States and we already have a nursing crisis,” Michaelene Panzarella, a registered nurse and member of the Office and Professional Employees, told the crowd.
• In Bangor, Maine, workers showed solidarity with the employees of Eastern Maine Medical Center who are trying to gain a voice at work for better pay and working conditions.
• In Eugene, Ore., Acuff joined with union members and their allies for a rally at the Federal Building to protest the NLRB’s anti-worker decisions.
• More than 70 people in Tampa, Fla., turned what was supposed to be a scheduled press conference into a rally for workers’ rights.
• In Seattle, union members and their allies joined with nurses for a rally at the Virginia Mason Medical Center to protest an attempt by management to silence the voices of registered nurses.

Workers also rallied in Albuquerque, N.M; Boston; Buffalo, N.Y.; Des Moines, Iowa; Hartford, Conn.; Milwaukee; Newark, N.J.; Phoenix; and San Diego.

The AFL-CIO and a group of 30 labor law professors filed separate motions yesterday to have the NLRB reconsider its refusal to hold oral arguments. “These cases may radically shift the line between labor and management, not only in the healthcare industry, but in virtually every industry and occupation,” the legal scholars said in a letter to the NLRB. “These cases deserve oral argument.”

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