Operating Engineers’ Counsel Among Picks for NLRB
Operating Engineers (IUOE) General Counsel Richard Griffin is among the three new members of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) President Obama will appoint through recess appointments, the White House announced.
Also named is Sharon Block, currently deputy assistant secretary for congressional affairs at the U.S. Department of Labor. She has served as the senior labor and employment counsel for the Senate HELP Committee. The third member named is Terence F. Flynn, chief counsel to NLRB member Brian Hayes. He also was counsel in the labor and employment law firm Crowell & Moring.
IUOE President James T. Callahan says Griffin is “highly respected by lawyers on both the labor and business side of labor law.”
His fair-minded approach to legal questions is exactly what the NLRB needs….Richard Griffin and the President’s other pick Sharon Block are distinguished attorneys who will bring an even-handed approach to labor and management issues. They deserve to be seated—and workers and employers deserve a functioning National Labor Relations Board.
School Supply Drive by Saginaw Labor Council to Kick Off United Way Campaign
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AFL-CIO Community Services Director Will Fischer sends us this report.
More than 90 children received school supply bags through donations of union members in 10 locals from Saginaw County, Mich. AFL-CIO/Michigan Community Services liaison Steven Lamb reports that earlier this month, the unions gave the school supply bags to the YMCA, First Ward Community Center, Salvation Army and the Neighborhood House to distribute to area school children.
Taking part in the donation drive: UAW locals 668, 699, 467, 6000 and 455; Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 557, Machinists (IAM) Local 557, Ironworkers Local 25, United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) Local 951 and Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 324. PMN Saginaw Metal Castings also contributed supplies.
Unions Respond to Devastating Montana Floods
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AFL-CIO Community Services Director Will Fischer reports on the flood relief efforts unions are mounting in Montana.
Montana has been hit hard by a series of recent severe storms coupled with runoff from mountain snow melt. The combination has caused serious flooding across the state. Forty-eight of the state’s 56 counties have declared flood emergencies and federal disaster declarations have been issued for 31 counties, plus four American Indian reservations.
The central Montana town of Roundup has been completely submerged in floodwaters. In northeast Montana, there is massive flooding in the town of Glasgow. The Crow Indian Reservation in southeastern Montana has been devastated by floodwaters displacing hundreds from their homes, and forcing more than 50 families to live in a gymnasium.
The Montana State AFL-CIO is working with coalition partners Montana Organizing Project, Forward Montana, along with central labor councils and union members throughout the state to coordinate a response effort to bring supplies to those in need and protect homes and other public buildings from water damage.
Job Safety Laws Must Not Go Backward
In Michigan yesterday, workers not only honored those killed and injured on the job as part of Workers Memorial Day ceremonies at the state Capitol in Lansing, they warned that plans to dismantle the Michigan Occupational Safety and Health Administration (MIOSHA) and repeal the state’s workplace safety law would put workers at risk.
UAW Region1C Director Norwood Jewell said:
We remember those that are injured and it brings to light the fact they are talking about defunding MIOSHA. We still have people dying in workplaces. We have come too far to go backwards.
Michigan AFL-CIO Health and Safety Director Derrick Quinney says, “Even in a common-sense topic like public safety, our Republican lawmakers have introduced legislation in Michigan that will repeal the Michigan Occupational and Safety Health Act in favor of a federal OSHA program.”
Instead of stripping away our law that we know works, why not update it with further rules and regulations to keep our workers safe on the job?
The real goal of our Republican legislature is to take away workers’ rights and weaken the role of protecting workers in the public. These are the same coordinated attacks that are happening in Wisconsin, Indiana, and Ohio. This isn’t about the budget—these attacks threaten the economic security and safety of all workers.
Read more here.
Elsewhere on Workers Memorial Day, Mike Staley of Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 649, offered a prayer during services at Laborers (LIUNA) Local 538 in Galesburg, Ill.
Indiana Workers Continue Monthlong Capitol Vigil
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Today marks the 23rd day Indiana teachers, public employees and other workers have been at the state Capitol protesting more than 30 bills backed by Republican lawmakers and Gov. Mitch Daniels (R). The legislative package includes bills that slash public school budgets, defund women’s health care and eliminate public-sector unions.
Indiana State AFL-CIO President Nancy Guyott says the four weeks of large crowds and actions:
have proven that the working men and women cannot be ignored. We will continue to make our voices heard until these politicians end this assault on working families in Indiana.
Mike Uehlein, AFL-CIO Field Communications Director for Indiana sends us these comments from workers who have been part of the month-long vigil.
Jeff Withered, Operating Engineers (IUOE) Local 399—We’re down here in the fight at the Statehouse for workers and also for the public schools. This is truly a fight about the working class, not the unions. We’re down here trying to get our word and get our message out and bring as much support as we can.
Pipeline Project Creates Thousands of Skilled Construction Jobs
More than 13,000 American workers will build the U.S. portion of a 2,000-mile oil pipeline running from Alberta, Canada, to Port Arthur, Texas, under a project labor agreement (PLA) signed this week by four U.S. unions and pipeline builder TransCanada Corp.
Mark Ayers, president of the AFL-CIO Building and Construction Trades Department (BCTD), says:
At a time when corporations and industries are seeking to ensure maximum efficiencies and a proper return on their investments, America’s building trades unions are pleased that TransCanada Corporation has recognized that a project labor agreement is a valuable tool to assist them in achieving those important objectives.
PLAs are pre-hire agreements between labor and management. The agreements require all construction jobs to be filled by local workers, include diversity requirements, establish wages and work rules covering overtime, working hours and dispute resolution and ensure that safety guidelines on the job site are enforced.
Union Members Help Keep Daimler Plant Open—and More Bargaining News
Union members negotiate a contract that keeps an Oregon Daimler Trucks plant from closing, and more news from the “Bargaining Digest Weekly.” The AFL-CIO Collective Bargaining Department delivers daily, bargaining-related news and research resources to more than 1,300 subscribers. Union leaders can register for this service through our website, Bargaining@Work.
SETTLEMENTS
Multiple, Daimler Trucks North America: Good news in Portland, Ore., where a Daimler Trucks North America plant slated for closure will remain open after union members ratified new three-year contracts with the company. Most of the nearly 700 workers are members of Machinists (IAM) Local 1005, and others are represented by Painters and Allied Trades (IUPAT) Local 1094, Teamsters Local 305 and SEIU Local 49.
Workers’ Stories Put Face on Victims of Wall Street Greed
One worker says she lost four jobs during the past seven years. Another saw his unemployment insurance (UI) benefits evaporate due to Sen. Jim Bunning’s (R-Ky.) callous filibuster of an UI extension last month.
Those are just two of the personal stories jobless workers and others have shared at the AFL-CIO’s Good Jobs Now site. Our interactive site is part of the AFL-CIO’s fight for good jobs that today kicked off two weeks of action across the country with rallies and demonstrations at branches of the Big Six Wall Street banks—Bank of America, Citibank, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and Wachovia-Wells Fargo. (Find out about events in your area here.)
The Big Six’s reckless greed played the major role in wrecking the U.S. economy and killing American jobs. The workers sharing their stories have seen firsthand the damage left behind.
American Labor Museum Honors Wowkanech
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Charles Wowkanech, president of the New Jersey State AFL-CIO, is being honored as a labor hero at this year’s 27th Annual Sol Stetin Awards Gala.
The award is bestowed every year by the American Labor Museum, located at the historic Botto House in Haldeon, N.J.
Wowkanech is being honored for his 12 years of service as leader of the state AFL-CIO and his decades of dedication to the union movement, both as an elected leader and a member of Local 68 of the Operating Engineers (IUOE).
The award is named in honor of the late Textile Workers president Sol Stetin.
Bargaining Wins for Public Employees in Los Angeles, Pennsylvania, Kentucky
Public employees across the country have been battling bruising attacks on their jobs and paychecks as cities and states sink into red ink. No more so than in California, where Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger achieved through budget cuts what he couldn’t in state referendums voted down by voters in 2008, a drastic reduction in state services. Yet in Los Angeles, city workers—members of several unions—ratified a new contract that averts furloughs and layoffs. State employees in Pennsylvania and Kentucky also have good news after mobilizing successfully to protect their paychecks and turn back cuts in benefits.
The Los Angeles city budget, adopted in May, called for layoffs and 26 furlough days per worker—amounting to a 10 percent cut in services and pay for every city program and every worker. Since then, members of the Coalition of LA City Unions in Los Angeles overwhelmingly approved a new contract with the city that preserves city services and avoids layoffs and furloughs. The new agreement will save more than half a billion dollars over the next three years, primarily through a retirement incentive program and delays in scheduled wage increases.
