NEW ORGANIZING
NLRB new organizing filings this week:
Manufacturing: The Chicago Midwest Regional Joint Board of Workers United/SEIU has filed for an NLRB election of 250 auto parts production workers at Borgers, in Norwalk, Ohio -- you’ll recall that these workers were on a recognition strike covered by Labor Notes, which ended on Sunday without having won recognition, so now they’re taking it to the NLRB -- this is not the usual order of operations. Two hundred workers at Transcontinental Ultra Flex, a subsidiary of a Canadian company which makes “flexible packaging” in Brooklyn, NY, are in a maybe-company-unions turf war, between United Production Workers Union, Local 17-18, which I mentioned last week, and the “Transportation, Production & Warehouse Employees Union Local 438,” which has no online presence I can find, is headquartered in Oak Brook, Illinois, and shares a phone number with the “National Production Workers Union,” three of whose four affiliates are dubbed “Local 707” and has been accused of being a company union since at least the 80s. IUPAT District Council 9 is organizing 43 glass production workers and glaziers at Diversified Glass & Storefronts in Orangeburg, New York. Nineteen elevator constructors are organizing with, you guessed it, the International Union of Elevator Constructors at Executive Elevator Company in Louisville.
Food: Teamsters Local 135 is organizing 400 production and distribution workers at Nestle in Anderson, Indiana. 25 workers at Taylor Farms in Yuma, Arizona, one of the largest vegetable suppliers for fast food and other mass production, are organizing with Teamsters Local 890. Six trainers at JBS meatpacking in Greeley, CO, are seeking to join the existing union there, UFCW Local 7.
Healthcare: The UE is organizing 35 “non-professional” workers at Planned Parenthood of Western PA in Pittsburgh. UFCW Local 21 seeks to represent 22 healthcare workers at 3 Providence RadiantCare clinics in eastern Washington state. AFSCME DC37 is organizing 8 direct care workers and RNs at the Institute for Community Living in Weeksville, Brooklyn.
Others: The Pennsylvania State Education Association is organizing 93 educators at the 21st Century Cyber Charter School in the Philly and Pittsburgh suburbs. 38 cold storage workers at Central Coast Cooling in El Centro, CA, are joining Teamsters Local 890. 26 security guards at Boeing Philadelphia in Ridley Park are joining the SPFPA. Seven newsroom employees at the Wyoming Tribune Eagle in Cheyenne are joining the Denver NewsGuild. Six electronic warfare and acoustic analysts at Valiant Global Defense Services in Oak Harbor, Washington, are joining either Machinists Lodge 160 or Lodge 282. Boilermakers Lodge 947 is organizing six handymen at the Urban Home Ownership Corp in NYC. Five service techs at an Audi dealership in Concord, California, are joining Machinists Local 1173. Four engineers and mechanics at BGIS in Piscataway, NJ, are joining Operating Engineers Local 68, 68A, 68B, 68C (each member gets their own local! Just kidding. Some unions, UFCW being a good example, create these alphabet soup type designations out of mergers and splits and jurisdictional changes, which is I assume what happened here). Operating Engineers Local 1 is organizing two production control clerks (no I don’t know what that is) at Miracorp (no I don’t know what they do). Two dispatchers at Mauser Packaging, which makes recycled packaging products, are joining Teamsters Local 705 in Chicago.
NLRB wins…: AFT Vermont has 87 healthcare members at Planned Parenthood of Northern New England after a 60-5 romp. 71 drivers and dispatchers at Diversified Transportation in Lancaster, CA voted 23-2 to join Teamsters Local 848. 31 retail workers at Bookshop Santa Cruz have joined CWA after an 18-10 vote that was closely watched and cheerleaded by DSA and EWOC folks who were involved early on. 27 shuttle bus drivers at BWI airport voted 16-2 to join ATU Local 1300. 27 security guards at St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children in Philly are now members of the SPFPA after a 13-1 vote. 25 workers who manufacture and test explosives in Biwabik, MN voted 15-9 to join Operating Engineers Local 49. Fourteen employees at BioBus in NYC, which does mobile science education, voted 11-0 to join OPEIU Local 153. Facing wage theft and the firing of workplace leaders, working with the Laundry Workers Center, ten workers at Wash Supply in NYC formed an independent union, the Laundry Workers Association, after a 5-1 vote. Four dispatchers at Bethlehem Haulage in PA are members of Teamsters Local 773 after a 4-0 vote.
...and losses: Ninety production workers at a Vons supermarket supplier in Riverside, CA, are not joining Teamsters Local 952 after a 16-44 vote. The Steelworkers lost an election among 88 mechanics and techs at Pratt Paper in Valparaiso, Indiana, after a 19-40 vote. 37 delivery drivers at Shamrock Foods in Meridian, Idaho, decertified their union, Teamsters Local 483, after a 4-26 vote. The Utility Workers lost an election at American Water Military Services in Highland, New York (the water suppliers for West Point), with 23 eligible workers voting 7-9.
About fifty editorial employees at Titmouse animation studio won voluntary recognition from their employer through IATSE Local 700, the Motion Picture Editors Guild.
The RWDSU Amazon drive in Alabama marches on, and the Biden White House is quietly supportive of the effort. The company has continued its brutal anti-union blitz. The other big drive happening right now, the 1400 Portland nurses organizing with NNU, is also getting pummeled by the boss. Reminder that this should be illegal in a democratic society.
NYT digs a little deeper on healthcare worker organizing during the pandemic; I think they buried the lede, that only “17 percent of nurses and 12 percent of other U.S. healthcare workers are covered by a union.”
For the month of January, unions won 40 of 57 NLRB elections, and the labor movement gained 2,200 new members through the NLRB. Spoiler: that’s almost certainly a net loss for the month, considering about 175,000 people turn 65 each month, and we had a net loss of over 25,000 union members per month in 2020. Thanks to @unionelections on Twitter for crunching the NLRB numbers.
STRIKES & BARGAINING
Two hundred refinery Teamsters at Marathon outside the Twin Cities are now locked out, with rumors of scabs on their way in from out of town, after a 24-hour strike two weeks ago today. The big issue is job cuts: the company wants to cut something like 20% of the union jobs at the facility. How do you negotiate with that?
Keystone Oaks educators outside of Pittsburgh are on strike. They’ve been without a contract since July, and in negotiations for over a year. Teachers in Mars, PA, also outside of Pittsburgh, have also threatened a strike by mid-February if they don’t get their contract settled by the 19th.
When the Utica, NY police department suspended a cop for pepper spraying a teenager on a porch, 36 cops protested by staging a sick-out/call-out the next day; this has now been found to have been an illegal strike, and the local PBA says they’ll never do it again.
Meanwhile, East Hartford, CT snow plowers with AFSCME Local 1174 are accusing the mayor of violating a state law for slandering the union by claiming that 40% of plowers called out sick during a snowstorm.
Grad student workers with SEIU Local 73 are meeting with management of Illinois State University and a federal mediator, after contract talks have been stalled for a long time; the union says management wants them to agree not just to a no-strike clause, but not to support any strikes, legal or illegal, on campus.
Adjunct faculty with SEIU at St. Petersburg College in Florida bargained a deal with the college, only to have it voted down by the Board of Trustees. At issue is a $150 ‘kill fee’ for adjuncts whose classes get cancelled.
Major League Soccer remains aggressive in its demands for COVID-19 concessions from the MLSPA; the union has offered to extend the existing contract to avoid a lockout in 2021.
Laborers Local 261, which represents about 350 workers in San Francisco’s Public Works department, is blaming the city for a COVID-19 outbreak among the membership which has left at least one member on a ventilator.
GM says they’re going majority-electric by 2035, and UAW local presidents say they’re ready.
K-12: The Chicago Teachers Union are on day-by-day strike/lockout watch, and Rachel Cohen has a great story in the Intercept on the anti-union and reopening efforts there. DC’s teachers union, the WTU, was forced back into reopening (despite what obviously should have been a snow day), and now the district wants a temporary restraining order against the union even talking with its members about striking, surely the hallmark of a free and democratic society. Cleveland Teachers Union leadership feels good about the vaccination plan in that district. The Sayreville, NJ teachers union is calling out the district for staying open during a large outbreak among student athletes. The Montclair district is suing the Montclair teachers union for an “illegal strike.” Toms River educators have a new tentative agreement, while Jersey Shore schools reopen. High school teachers outside Chicago are filing a ULP against their district over their return. The Cincinnati Federation of Teachers has sued the district for a temporary restraining order on school returns at least until March 1. So have the Buffalo teachers. Minneapolis teachers won their injunction to allow teachers to keep teaching remotely. More K-12 union news from Philly, Baltimore, Iowa City bus drivers, Nazareth, PA, Albuquerque, Amherst, MA, Fairbanks, and California.
LEGISLATION & POLITICS
Unions at Kroger companies up and down the West Coast have been organizing for hazard pay laws in local jurisdictions. When they won such a provision in Long Beach, California, the company responded by closing two grocery stores. A similar fight is brewing in Los Angeles. Who knew runaway shops could come to the grocery industry? If they don’t like the city provisions, maybe they’d prefer a statewide law.
The newly-formed Congressional Labor Caucus -- which I still don’t really understand how or why it was formed -- has endorsed its first pieces of legislation, the PRO Act, the Raise the Wage Act, and the National Apprenticeships Act. Meanwhile, Marty Walsh had his confirmation hearing for DOL Secretary, and the PRO Act was officially reintroduced.
BCTGM Local 19 endorsed Nina Turner for Congress in the May 4th special election to fill HUD Secretary nominee Marcia Fudge’s seat; they’re the first union to weigh in in the race.
UNION LEADERSHIP
The Oregonian has the first new reporting on the 2021 AFL-CIO Presidential race in, like, over a year? Replete with on the record quotes from high-up labor officials. Punchline is still unclear, with Sara Nelson remaining “adamantly cagy,” and rumors still swirling about Trumka’s next move.
Past AFL-CIO President, and the first to win a leadership challenge at the Federation, John Sweeney passed away on Monday. He was 86.
The United Mine Workers have a newly-appointed international vice president.
The Houston Fire Department has fired the IAFF president of Local 341, which represents almost 4,000 firefighters, in the latest shot across the bough in an internal war between the IAFF and the City.
The former president of IUE-CWA 81427, which represents utility workers in Union County, NJ, was charged with embezzling about $600k from the union’s health and welfare funds.
Eight workers at Erie Water Works have won a Fairness Center-backed lawsuit against their union, AFSCME 2206, for supposedly misleading them during contract negotiations.
Members of Teamsters Local 385, which represents workers at Disney World, are suing the International Brotherhood of Teamsters over a trusteeship the international imposed in June 2019, exceeding the standard 18-month time limit on these things.
Union density took yet another hit, as Donald Trump quit SAG-AFTRA. Union leadership said it best in their statement.
The week in US unions, Jan 28-Feb 4, 2021
Also, an update for the "Union Leadership" section: Douglas Isaacson, the 30-year president of UPWU, lost a contested election! The pictures of Pres. Isaacson delivering retropay checks to happy workers have been purged from the website gallery. https://local1718.com/election-updates
The NPWU has also been active in California in the cannabis industry: https://www.thestrikewave.com/original-content/inside-the-organization-behind-protech-local-33