A Thousand Letters to Tom Corbett
 |
This is a cross-post from Working America’s Main Street blog.
Working America members, teachers and unemployed Pennsylvanians on both sides of the state delivered more than 1,000 handwritten postcards to Gov. Tom Corbett’s regional offices in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. We wanted Corbett to know the drastic, widespread and ultimately disastrous results of the budget cuts he enacted last year. We wanted him to make good on the rhetoric used in his first year, which called for “shared sacrifice.”
There has been a great deal of sacrifice. But it has not been shared. It has been targeted, acute and painful. And while the brunt has fallen on students, low-income families and public workers, 70 percent of Pennsylvania’s businesses pay nothing in income taxes.
“The budget cuts have added to the pool of unemployed workers by contributing to the elimination of 14,000 jobs in education alone,” says Mary Karscig, an unemployed nurse and Working America member who wrote to Corbett. Some 21,000 Pennsylvanians lost their jobs due to budget cuts alone, many of them due to nearly $900 million slashed from public education. We’ve written about the many school districts in Pennsylvania now facing the fiscal brink, with the bankrupt Chester Upland School District as a sign of things to come. The New York Times reported yesterday that 75 percent of Pennsylvania classrooms now have more kids than they did in 2010.
“I feel worried about the impacts of these cuts on my job search, and I am even more worried about their impacts on my son’s job search,” says Mary.
She adds: “My son will go wherever there is a job, and there is a pretty high chance he’ll have to move out of state.”
Community Services Welcomes New Liaison
 |
||||
|
||||
AFL-CIO Community Services Director Will Fischer sends us this report.
We are excited to introduce our new AFL-CIO Community Service Liaison for the Erie-Crawford Central Labor Council in Pennsylvania, Ron Oliver. A Steelworker for more than 20 years, Oliver has long been involved with United Steelworkers (USW) Local 3199, USW District 10, the central labor council and community services.
Oliver’s experience and passion for community service and the labor movement have always been admired by his peers and he has been involved with everything from strike assistance to Christmas parties for underprivileged children.
Oliver says:
As a community service committee member, I had the opportunity to work with and learn a great deal from former liaison, Brother Tony Ferritto. I look forward to continuing and building on the programs we have in place and expanding community services to new heights. Together there’s really nothing we can’t do. A lot of folks are in need and the labor movement is about helping people.
5,000 Rally in Pa.: Budget Should Not Be Balanced on Backs of Workers
 |
The Pennsylvania AFL-CIO communications team, Jim Deegan and Karen Gownley, sent us this report.
Some 5,000 private- and public-sector union workers came together in Harrisburg, Pa., yesterday to rally for a responsible budget. Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President Richard Bloomingdale called it an incredible event because it
“wasn’t just about public sector workers—this was about ALL working men and women in our state. Today they all came together and demanded that the budget not be balanced on the backs of working families.
Gov. Tom Corbett’s recent budget proposal slashes millions from public education and other vital public services. Meanwhile, big corporations like Marcellus Shale gas drillers, pay little or no taxes to the state. As Pennsylvania AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Frank Snyder put it:
The corporate loopholes must be closed. It is time corporations pay their fair share.
As Part of One Nation, Union Members Mobilize to Get Out the Vote
While tens of thousands of union members were marching for jobs and economic justice on 10-2-10 in One Nation Working Together rally in Washington, D.C., thousands of their brothers and sisters across the country were knocking on union family doors and volunteering to get out the vote for 11-2-10.
In Ohio, union families in Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus and Dayton fanned out in neighborhoods spreading the word that Nov. 2 is about jobs and the candidates who will fight for jobs to rebuild the economy–candidates like Ted Strickland for governor, Lee Fisher for U.S. Senate and Betty Sutton for U.S. House.
Along with organizing a 28-bus convoy to One Nation, the Pennsylvania AFL-CIO launched a Day of Door Knocking Action around the state where several hundred union volunteers spent part of their Saturday visiting union households to communicate with their co-workers, friends and neighbors about working family issues.
In California, union members distributed fliers outlining the Wall Street/corporate platform of Republican gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman and U.S. Senate candidate Carly Fiorina.
Kentucky working families were out in force for U.S. Senate candidate Jack Conway who is running strong campaign against Tea Party-backed Republican Rand Paul and Paul’s platform to phase out and privatize Social Security and Medicare.
For more on Labor 2010, click here.
In Pa. 12th District, Critz Backs Keeping Jobs At Home
 |
|
Democrat Mark Critz is the only candidate in the May 18 special election in Pennsylvania’s 12th congressional district who believes it’s time to stop tax breaks for companies that move overseas and give them to companies that create jobs here in America.
By contrast, his Republican opponent Tim Burns shipped Pennsylvania jobs offshore and opposes caps on CEO pay.
Check out the new AFL-CIO radio ad, which shows clearly why working people in Pennsylvania’s 12th congressional district are backing Mark Critz.
25,000 City Workers Near Contract in San Francisco—and More Bargaining News
25,000 city workers in San Francisco reach a tentative agreement—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 1,200 subscribers. Union leaders can register for this service through our website, Bargaining@Work.
NEGOTIATIONS
Multiple, City of San Francisco: Unions, representing more than 25,000 city workers, have reached a two-year tentative agreement with San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, which will help the city close its massive $483 million budget gap. If approved, city workers will take 12 furlough days a year, including the shutdown of nonessential services between Christmas and New Year’s Day.
800 Steelworkers at Kaiser Win Wage Increases—and More Bargaining News
Some 800 United Steelworkers members at Kaiser Aluminum negotiate a wage increase and signing bonus in their new five-year pact, 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 1,200 subscribers. Union leaders can register for this service through our website, Bargaining@Work.
SETTLEMENTS
USW, Kaiser Aluminum: 800 Kaiser Aluminum workers in Heath, Ohio, and Spokane, Wash., ratified a new five-year contract effective Oct. 1. The contract provides the United Steelworkers (USW) members a signing bonus and wage increases.
Shuler in Pennsylvania: We Must Inspire Next Generation
 |
Speaking at last night’s annual dinner of the Southeastern Area Labor Federation of Pennsylvanian, AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Liz Shuler told the state’s union members we must get energized and active so that we can address the needs of a generation of young workers left behind by an economy that isn’t working:
We need to reach out to millions of unorganized workers who just don’t see us as the answer to their problems. To tell you the truth, they don’t see us at all. Above all, that means young workers in their 20s and 30s….They don’t have a connection to the union movement….No wonder young workers don’t realize what we have to offer them.
Shuler, who has been traveling nearly non-stop since becoming the youngest person ever elected as a top AFL-CIO officer last month, cited the AFL-CIO report “Young Workers: A Lost Decade,” which found that workers under age 35 have been hit especially hard by the economic crisis. The economic hardship damages their earning power now and well into the future.
Employee Free Choice Act Backers Out by the Hundreds of Thousands This Summer
 |
|
More than 150,000 union members and supporters turned out for events, rallies, parades and picnics in recent days, to show their support for the Employee Free Choice Act, federal legislation that would level the playing field for workers seeking to form unions and bargain for a better life.
In a letter to the Baton Rouge Advocate, Michael Day, a member of the Plumbers and Pipe Fitters (UA) in Louisiana, writes that in the face of more than 25,000 acts of discrimination against employees trying to form a union every year, Congress must pass the Employee Free Choice Act:
I can’t understand a good Democrat having a problem supporting a bill such as the Employee Free Choice Act that levels the playing field between employees and corporations and puts the choice of joining or not joining a union in the hands of working men and women.
I voted for change that I could believe in, not change that I can’t notice.
Jobless Workers Can’t Feed Their Families While States Sit on $3 Billion in UI Funds
 |
|
With unemployment at its highest levels in decades, it’s unbelievable that some $3.1 billion in unemployment insurance (UI) benefits included in the federal economic recovery package is not being spent because 23 states have not yet revised state rules covering jobless benefits.
Today’s USA TODAY reports that nearly 350,000 out-of-work Americans could get benefits if all those states revamp their unemployment systems to qualify for money that is included in the federal stimulus package.
In 11 of the states, Republican governors or legislatures have refused to modify the rules governing unemployment insurance to qualify for about $1.7 billion in stimulus funds. The other 12 states have made only some of the changes, not applied for the funds or not taken legislative votes on the changes. Although the states have until 2011 to change the laws, the reality is that many states need the money now and the workers really need it now.
