Happy Labor Day! Lots going on in the past couple weeks, and I happened to write about a bunch of exciting new organizing efforts for Labor Notes: I did two interviews about the Starbucks Workers United campaign, one with Aneil Tripathi, leader of the Anderson, South Carolina organizing efforts, and one with Daisy Pitkin, national field director of the campaign. I also wrote about the Trader Joe’s (and other grocery) organizing efforts, plus spoke with the amazing organizers behind the first-ever Chipotle union. I would hope that anyone who reads this newsletter is already a subscriber to and supporter of Labor Notes, but if not, please throw us a few bucks and subscribe to our print magazine!
STRIKES & NEGOTIATIONS
Healthcare: Over 2,000 mental healthcare workers at Kaiser in Northern California remain on strike into their third week with NUHW, and has spread to the 50 NUHW mental healthcare workers in Hawaii as well, while the California Nurses Association picketed Kaiser across the state as their contract negotiations heat up. Meanwhile, 15,000 members of the Minnesota Nurses Association have set a strike date for September 12, and are planning to walk off the job for three days (unlike the Kaiser strike, which is open-ended); over 7,000 healthcare workers and related at the Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, OR have authorized a strike by an overwhelming margin; and 6,000 more with the Michigan Nurses Association have authorized a strike as well; while at least 1500 nurses with SEIU Healthcare Wisconsin at UW Health in Madison, WI are planning to strike for re-recognition, September 13-16, another casualty of Act 10 that has been unresolved since 2014; and 1,000 healthcare workers for Kaleida in Buffalo are taking a strike vote with CWA Local 1168 and 1199 SEIU this month. Around 700 workers at 14 nursing homes are on strike with SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania as of Friday morning.
The other 2,000-strong strike in California, that of Frontier telecom workers with CWA District 9, ended with an agreement on subcontracting, as my colleague Luis Feliz Leon reported at The Real News.
The next two biggest strikes are still on, with no particular end in sight. The New York Times woke up to the Warrior Met UMWA strike in Brookwood, AL, breaking the news just 500 days late (and with shockingly no reference to the independent reporters like Kim Kelly and the https://mobile.twitter.com/LaborReporters/with_repliesValley Labor Report who’ve been all over the story since 500 days ago), but to their credit did feature a fantastic interview with Braxton Wright, a striking coal miner; other news from the strike is that the company is attempting to fire 40 of the strikers, obviously testing the waters here. Meanwhile, the UAW CNH strike in Burlington, IA and Racine, WI hasn’t seen any real movement, as far as I can tell; if you want to read some depressing things about it, check out the comments this industry website got back in a survey to farm equipment dealers. You’ll see in that former link too that the ten unions who were going to strike American Ordnance at the Iowa Army Ammunition Plant in Middletown, IA reached a last-minute tentative agreement and kept churning out large-caliber ammo. And elsewhere Iowa, over 100 workers on strike with BCTGM Local 100G at ingredient maker Ingredion marked a month on strike in Cedar Rapids, IA; the biggest sticking point sounds like the $500 health insurance premium hike the company wants to impose.
K-12: As school starts up amidst a national teacher shortage, a decade of teacher union strike activity, and the extreme disruption of the pandemic, no one should be surprised that the K-12 strike has come back with a vengeance. In Columbus, OH, 4,500 educators struck the state’s largest district for four days, and won a contract with 4% annual raises (they had proposed 8%) and guaranteed air conditioning, which had been a flagship demand. Teachers in Kent, WA are entering their second week on strike, primarily over class sizes, while teachers in Ridgefield, WA, on the Oregon border, have authorized a strike of their own, and those in Port Angeles, WA, on the state’s northern edge, plan to strike next week, and, oh yeah, the 6,000-strong Seattle union is taking a strike vote. Non-union school bus drivers in Franklin County, TN struck for two days after being denied a $10,000 raise that was already in the budget; by Thursday, the county commissioner reinstituted the raise. 2,000 Philadelphia school district workers with SEIU 32BJ, primarily bus drivers, custodians, and maintenance workers, authorized a strike but got an agreement before their August 31st deadline. Peoria, IL’s 850 educators have authorized a strike as well. And not K-12 unionism in the conventional sense, but the staff of the Maryland State Education Association held a protest against management (in this case, the union leadership) for failure to bargain a staff contract.
Higher education: With the school year starting in higher ed as well, there’s been plenty of campus labor activity: SEIU Local 500 struck very effectively for a week at DC’s American University, and won a contract for 600 staff. Teamsters Local 320, representing 1500 workers at the University of Minnesota, picketed for a $20 minimum wage on the first day of school, as did adjunct faculty with the Steelworkers at Pittsburgh’s Point Park University. AAUP-AFT Local 4996 at the University of Alaska filed an unfair labor practice charge with the state labor board for the administration’s attempt to impose a final offer. At Eastern Michigan University in Ypsilanti, MI, the union rejected a contract offer from the administration, calling for higher raises.
Starbucks Workers United has not stopped going on strike, and are likely holding a “sip-in” this weekend at a store near you. I interviewed their national field director, Daisy Pitkin, for Labor Notes about their strategy, as things continue to escalate even as Howard Schultz formally leaves as CEO (though I still hope he has to record a video about his crimes). Meanwhile, in the past couple weeks, Starbucks workers have struck in Minneapolis, Chicago, Buffalo (twice), Seattle and Everett, WA, and the two remaining locations in Ithaca, NY (the third having been likely illegally closed).
Workers at local sandwich chain Homegrown in the Seattle area are unionizing with UNITE HERE Local 8 and multiple locations have gone on strike, over driver-facing surveillance cameras, lack of A/C, and sick pay, plus to get the company to recognize their union after delivering a majority petition. Elsewhere in the state, my coworker Caitlyn Clark wrote about how port truck mechanics in Tacoma, WA doubled their pay by going on strike with the ILWU.
80 building services workers at a Fort Lee, NJ housing complex, Horizon House, went on strike with 32BJ SEIU after working under an expired contract since May.
Nine ready-mix drivers for SRM Construction in Centreville, IL struck for 12 days (I think; details are spotty) before winning a tentative agreement.
The biggest maybe-strike threat in the country by far is that of the national railroad bargaining; Joe DeManuelle-Hall had a very useful update on the situation for Labor Notes; the upshot is we are once again in a “cooling-off” period which ends September 16, but the rank and file does not seem to be cooling off much at all. The question is whether that anger will be officially channeled into a work stoppage. So far, five (the American Train Dispatchers Association, IBEW, and the three unions affiliated with the Machinists, namely the Transportation Communications Union, the Brotherhood of Railway Carmen, and Machinists District 19) of the thirteen rail unions have announced tentative agreements based on the Presidential Emergency Board recommendations, which is to say, nine have not. Yet. The BLET (affiliated with the Teamsters) already authorized a strike before the Presidential Emergency Board was convened, and the BMWE (also a Teamsters affiliate — isn’t rail union jurisdiction fun?) has sent out strike authorization ballots but hasn’t announced results. Yet. The latest is that the National Mediation Board is apparently ordering negotiators for the carriers and the unions to travel to DC on Wednesday for help reaching agreements, and I don’t know what to make of that except that it doesn’t exude confidence that an agreement would otherwise be worked out.
Lots of Steelworkers contract updates in the past couple weeks; the 5,900-worker Goodyear/Bridgestone contract that came down to the wire was ratified by the membership; 800 workers with USW Local 7687 at BAE in York County, PA came within hours of striking, but got a last-minute deal; I’ve seen exactly zero reporting on it, but some 500 workers with USW Local 6163 at ATI in Millersburg, OR have authorized a strike, which is particularly notable since ATI was the site of a five-month-long strike in Western Pennsylvania, New York, and Massachusetts last year, so I wouldn’t be shocked if this one came to fruition; and, the really big one, Cleveland-Cliffs and the USW reached a tentative agreement covering 12,000 workers that is now up for a ratification vote, though the union isn’t sharing any details publicly or, from chatter I’ve seen, much with the members.
Again, not much coverage on this one, but city workers with AFSCME Local 829 in South San Francisco, CA are talking about striking, from preschool teachers to 911 dispatchers. Workers with UNITE HERE Local 355 at the Diplomat Beach Resort in Hollywood, FL (a Hilton hotel) are taking a strike authorization vote, and the union posted an awesome 11-second video on Twitter, and after a very long campaign, UNITE HERE Local 11 won union recognition at Los Angeles’s Chateau Marmont. 165 workers at the Philadelphia Museum of Art who organized almost two years ago with AFSCME District Council 47 have unanimously authorized a strike for their first contract. Kroger workers in the Columbus, OH area with UFCW Local 1059 have voted down a contract offer for the second time since July (I hesitate to link to the above with its link to sectarian nonsense but it’s the only source I’ve seen on it).
SAG-AFTRA has just reached two new deals relaxing employer rules on “exclusivity” (meaning when an actor who’s a regular on a show can do other work) both with the AMPTP and as part of a full contract ratification (that passed a membership vote by 89%) with Netflix.
Teamsters Local 118, which represents police in Wayne County, NY, has declared impasse and is taking its case to the state’s labor board.
IBEW Local 304 in Topeka, KS picketed at energy company Evergy in protest of pay disparities and the company’s work from home policies. IBEW Local 363 in the Hudson Valley, NY continues to protest out-of-state hires on a big warehouse building project.
Union negotiations at the VA are not going well, apparently, as AFGE is calling for the agency secretary to remove the administration’s lead negotiator.
The MEBA members who operate the Staten Island Ferry won a favorable ruling from a judge but apparently the City Comptroller still has to actually implement the raise in question, which they’ve gone without since 2010.
POLITICS & LEGISLATION
Politico had an exclusive look at how GOP leadership plans to target the NLRB and Department of Labor in oversight hearings if it takes back control of the House in the midterms, as it’s slated to do. I spoke to Chris Lehmann about it for a broader piece he did on the Democrats and class politics in The Nation.
Lots of labor activity has happened in the California legislature in the past couple weeks: a much-touted SEIU-backed fast food “sectoral bargaining” bill passed after years of effort (I’m of two minds on this sort of thing in the absence of strong worker organization, and this measured thread from Brian Callaci on the bill is worth consideration); the UFW-backed bill to allow vote-by-mail in farmworker union elections passed the legislature, but is sitting on Governor Gavin Newsom’s desk, which is egregious but not shocking, and now Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden are publicly leaning on the Governor to sign it, which is interesting from the perspective of intra-party politics (and, like, the UFW is not a big union); the state’s legislative staff was denied the right to legally form a union, to boos and hisses from the staff; and though their deal to trade seismic safety updates to hospitals for a $25 minimum wage for healthcare workers collapsed, SEIU-UHW is apparently still pursuing legislation for a statewide increase for those workers.
Charlie Crist, Democratic nominee for Florida Governor, thus going up against the much-hyped Ron DeSantis, has chosen the president of United Teachers of Dade, the 30,000-member K-12 union, as his running mate. I find this primarily notable because of how seldom union leadership is tapped for political candidacies, and how odd it is that it would happen among Florida teachers of all labor groups.
A judge has granted class-action status to a group of 22,000 Teamster retirees in New York who are suing the federal government over pension cuts; I don’t follow this stuff all that closely but the Teamster retiree movement has been very active, and is a huge issue for labor that doesn’t get much attention.
Apparently Black business interests in Seattle are opposing a piece of city legislation on the table to create what sounds like a soft version of a hiring hall, backed by UFCW Local 3000. Interesting snapshot of the politics of labor and race in the emerging legal weed industry.
INTERNAL UNION POLITICS
One of the best pieces of labor journalism I’ve read this year is Tyler Jett’s latest series for the Des Moines Register about the Congolese immigrant worker who recently won the top spot in UFCW Local 441 in a landslide election; but the story is about so much else: meatpacking workers in the pandemic, protection unions in the industry over decades, and how immigrant workers and new leadership can change the labor movement.
In two big shake-ups in Western Conference Teamsters politics, Ron Herrera, just recently the incumbent-backed candidate for the second slot in the union and current president of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, has abruptly resigned his spot at the head of Teamsters Local 396; I’ve seen rumors but no actual reporting on what’s behind the move. And in New Mexico, the top officers of Teamsters Local 492 have resigned in the wake of financial investigations and the IBT moving all film work in the local’s jurisdiction over to Local 399.
NALC has just mailed (naturally) ballots in its elections for national officers; I don’t know much about the race but people who do have told me that at least the challenger for the top office is a perennial candidate who’s not expected to win.
The Vermont AFL-CIO has named a new Executive Vice President, and committed at their Convention to fight for abortion rights legislation.
NEW ORGANIZING
Recent election filings at the NLRB: 120 workers for DB Schenker, who do contract work building airplanes for Spirit AeroSystems in Wichita, KS, are organizing with the Machinists. 94 more Apple store workers have filed for a union election with CWA in Oklahoma City, which is very exciting, after the efforts in Atlanta (CWA) and NYC (Workers United, I think?) petered out and the Towson, MD (Machinists) store won but nobody immediately followed their lead. There have been rumors of a big CWA drive at Apple but post-Atlanta there had been no public signs of life as far as I’d seen, so Oklahoma City could be the start of a big re-launch. I accidentally neglected to list new filings at Starbucks last week, so may have made it seem like there weren’t any, which is not the case, though things are still a lot slower than they have been over recent months. Over the past three weeks, 96 workers at six stores filed to join Starbucks Workers United in Boston, Portland, ME, Washington, DC, Hayward, CA, Victor, NY, and Santa Fe, NM. 65 warehouse workers for Pepsi in Tumwater, WA are organizing with Teamsters Local 252. 36 staffers at Columbus-based Ohio Disability Rights Law and Policy Center are joining OPEIU Local 792. 35 journalists at the Louisville Courier-Journal are the latest Gannett employees to file for an election with the Indianapolis NewsGuild. More baristas outside of Starbucks are unionizing with Workers United, specifically 30 workers at Elixr Coffee in Philadelphia. 30 pipefitters and welders building a Google data center for contractor Bernhard in New Albany, OH are unionizing with UA Local 189 after a judge found the company illegally refused to hire union supporters. 28 dispensary workers at Sunday Goods in Tempe, AZ are joining UFCW Local 99 and 21 dispensary workers at Columbia Care in Riverhead, NY are unionizing with RWDSU Local 338. 26 workers at the Pittsburgh Community Broadcast Corporation are joining SAG-AFTRA. 18 staffers at what I think is a social services non-profit, Western Massachusetts Training Consortium, in Northampton, MA, are joining UAW Local 2322. 17 subcontracted workers at the SeaTac airport are unionizing with Machinists District Lodge 751. 15 massage therapists at Massage Luxe in Crete Coeur, MO are joining Teamsters Local 610. 14 workers at Chase House, a residential home for adolescents in Boulder, CO are unionizing with UFCW Local 7. 11 oil terminal operators for Vopak in Long Beach, CA are joining Teamsters Local 848. 11 workers at the Burlington House nursing home in Cincinnati are unionizing with SEIU 1199 WV/KY/OH. Nine utility workers for Eversource in Berlin, CT are joining IBEW Local 420. Eight mechanics and drivers for Sunbelt Rentals in Taylor, MI are joining Operating Engineers Local 324. Six “utility vegetation management” (I think this might be the latest name for tree trimmers? But not sure) workers for ACRT and three more for Davey Tree Expert in Holtsville, NY are joining IBEW Local 1049. Six lab techs at DFA Dairy in Sharpsville, PA are joining Teamsters Local 261.
NLRB election wins…: I missed this one a few weeks back, but 173 workers at Equitas Health Center at several locations across the state unionized with Ohio Federation of Teachers, 62-45. 169 Starbucks workers in six stores in Berkeley, CA, Wilmington, NC, Springfield, MO, Allison Park, PA, Roseville, MN, and Greenbush, NY voted a combined 69-30 to join Starbucks Workers United, with three stores losing their union votes, in Garden Grove, CA, Warwick, RI, and Scottsboro, AL, in a 9-9, 9-9, and 8-8 deadlock, respectively, St. Charles, MO losing 4-11, and San Pablo, CA losing 3-11. 160 transit workers for Via (which used to be a rideshare app is now a ‘micro-transit’ app) voted 57-35 to unionize with ATU Local 1177 in Norfolk, VA; Joe DeManuelle-Hall, who covers transit for Labor Notes, provided some useful context to this win on Twitter. 116 workers at REI in Berkeley, CA unionized with UFCW Local 5 by 56-38, another promising national retail shop win, following the UFCW-affiliated RWDSU winning the first toehold in the company in NYC in March. It’s not quite the “next Starbucks,” but two for two ain’t bad; just 175 more locations to go. 89 workers for the Delta Natural Gas Company in Kentucky joined the Utility Workers in a 50-27 vote. 81 healthcare workers for John Muir Health in Concord, CA voted 50-22 to join SEIU-UHW. 75 workers at MOM’s Organic Market in Baltimore voted 58-5 (a landslide) to join Teamsters Local 570, the first union shop in the 29-store regional chain (I interviewed one of the workers as part of this story, if you’re interested). 63 workers who I think make animal feed for Land O’ Lakes in Madera, CA voted 38-13 to join Teamsters Local 517. 47 transit workers for contractor MV Transportation in Ypsilanti, MI voted 18-3 to join the ATU. 43 workers at Brooklyn Bowl (but in Philadelphia) voted 23-0 to join IATSE Local 8. 36 lead nurses at Providence St. Vincent Medical Center in Portland, OR voted 27-6 to join the Oregon Nurses Association, and 38 hospital techs at St. Anthony Hospital in Pendleton, OR voted 24-10 to do the same. 38 more workers for Card Kingdom in Seattle, but this time at their card game bar Mox Boarding House, have unionized with CWA after their big warehouse voted to do so recently with UFCW Local 3000; they won their union 25-1. The first Chipotle in the country has unionized with Teamsters Local 243 in Lansing, MI, with 21 workers voting 11-3; obviously another hugely exciting retail breakthrough, with a lot of potential, as the Fortune 500 burrito company operates nearly 3,000 locations. It’s also a much-needed shot in the arm after the company closed the first location that filed for a union vote in Maine. 18 workers for Maytag Aircraft at Fort Hood, TX voted 15-0 to join the Machinists. 18 workers at the state of Colorado’s subcontracted emissions testing service, Air Care Colorado, voted 9-6 to unionize with UFCW Local 7 in Denver. At least 14 (it’s unclear) workers at the Eagleview nursing home in Pittsgrove voted on unionization in two separate votes; the cooks voted it down, 0-2, but the RNs voted 6-4 to join UFCW Local 152. All 13 digital editors at Newsday in Melville, NY voted to join GCC-IBT Local 406-C. 12 workers who I believe do lead paint inspections for Inspection Experts at several locations in Tennessee voted 8-1 to join Operating Engineers Local 369. Nine charter bus drivers for Battle’s Transportation in Philadelphia voted 5-0 to join the “United Independent Union” which I don’t even have a snarky thing to say about, but in transit, unions you’ve never heard of that emphasize their “independent” quality are often company-friendly unions that help employers avoid real unions. Eight dispensary workers for Mayflower Medicinals in Allston, MA voted 3-0 to join UFCW Local 1445. Seven Verizon retail workers in Portland, OR voted 4-1 to join CWA; this small shop is a big deal as the telecom giants continue the long transition away from landline work to retail wireless, and very few of these stores have organized. Six workers for Japanese food supplier Mutual Trading Co. in Poway, CA voted unanimously to join Teamsters Local 630.
…and losses: Workers at two big sawmills voted against joining the Machinists in pretty big margins; 154 workers at a Weyerhaeuser sawmill in Eugene, OR voted 39-73 against the union, and 128 workers at a Resolute Forest Products sawmill in El Dorado, AR voted 15-52 against unionizing. Lumber products in the West and Northwest were a historic bastion of the most radical parts of the labor movement once upon a time, but that was a century ago. 108 grocery workers at New Seasons Market in Hillsboro, OR voted 37-60 against joining UFCW Local 555, which, just saying, is the second time in a week the UFCW has lost or backed off a union drive where an independent union has succeeded. 57 healthcare workers at a dozen urgent care facilities owned by Franciscan Medical Group in and around the Seattle area voted 21-23 not to join the Union of American Physicians and Dentists 43 drivers and mechanics for the Sonoma County (CA) Airport Express voted 5-27 against joining Teamsters Local 665. 21 workers at Semper Fi Express, a DHL subcontractor, in Bloomington, IL voted 5-13 against joining Teamsters Local 26. 16 workers at LSR Refinishing in Clinton, MD voted 2-11 not to join IUPAT Local 890. 15 maintenance workers for a subcontractor at the Merck facilities in North Wales, PA voted 5-7 against joining UA Local 420. Not quite a loss, but the 14 Petco workers who are organizing in Seattle with UFCW Local 3000 have withdrawn their NLRB petition, for now. Similarly, not quite a loss, but I wrote about how UFCW Local 7 has dropped its bid to unionize the third Trader Joe’s store in the country. Of the eight workers who make hinges and other steel products for Carlsen Manufacturing in Rome, GA, three voted, and they all voted no on joining UA Local 72 (in a rerun of a March vote that was 0-6, so I guess the union improved its outcome).
Decertifications and raids: Usually don’t report on decertification filings but it’s notable that a decertification petition has been filed at the Mayo Clinic in Austin, MN against Steelworkers Local 11-00578, since a big Mayo Clinic facility just decertified the Minnesota Nurses Association in a very contentious vote last month; Mayo is also trying to decert 32 more RNs with MNA in Lake City. 98 workers at Penske Truck Leasing in Cincinnati and Erlanger, KY beat back a decertification attempt, sticking with Machinists Local 804, 41-28. 58 workers at Pepsi in Sedalia, MO decertified Teamsters Local 41, by 7-32. 54 workers at the Montecito Heights nursing home in Los Angeles dropped SEIU Local 2015 in a 16-22 vote.
Outside the NLRB & other new organizing drives: Some 3,000 grad workers at Boston University have gone public with their union organizing campaign with SEIU Local 509. The Teamsters are undergoing a huge organizing drive at DHL in Cincinnati, which would add 1,500 members to the 4,000 already-organized Teamster DHL workers. The MLBPA has officially begun distributing union cards to organize the minor leagues, which would obviously be a huge and prominent campaign. I missed this at the time (thanks for the flag, Lee Harris), but the UMWA has a deal with electric car battery maker SPARKZ to organize (I can’t tell if it’s neutrality, or recognition, or maybe just some “labor-management partnership” thing that’s fuzzier than that) 350 workers at a plant being built in West Virginia. Around 180 workers at GE in Auburn, AL have announced their campaign to unionize with IUE-CWA. 100 tech workers at The Atlantic have won voluntary recognition with the New York NewsGuild. About 90 workers in the Pierce County, WA public defenders’ office won a card-check vote to join SEIU Local 925, and some 50 workers who make electric buses for New Flyer in Jamestown, NY also won a (private) card-check election, joining the IUE-CWA. Public library workers in Grandview Heights, OH are organizing with AFT. The Architectural Workers Union, affiliated with the Machinists, has won its first unit by voluntary recognition at a small firm in New York City.
Store closures (here’s to hoping this won’t become a new category): The day its employees had planned to go on strike, the Nashville restaurant Chaatable abruptly closed for good; food service workers in the city have been organizing with Workers Dignity, a local workers center. Meanwhile, Knead Pizza in Harrisburg, PA closed just after workers announced their intention to unionize with UNITE HERE.
A new federal report says there are 300,000 federal workers who are eligible for unionization but haven’t been organized; not just those who don’t pay dues, but those who aren't covered under a union contract. For context, AFGE, the largest of the federal unions, reports just over 300,000 dues-paying members, so lots of room to grow here.
Amazon has finally lost its ridiculous appeal at the NLRB not to recognize the Amazon Labor Union in Staten Island, NY, and, separately, the Board has ruled that the Schodack, NY election will go ahead over the company’s spurious objections.
Finally, the ever-essential “State of the Unions” report is out for 2022 and is very much worth your time; we are still in decline, despite all the good news of the past year, and that’s still the headline for the US labor movement. Plus much more of interest in here.
The past two weeks in US unions, August 20th-September 3rd, 2022
Thanks as always, Jonah! The CWA 1168 and 1199 strike vote in Buffalo will cover 6,300 members across the two unions. If you need any details once the vote is counted and we move forward, feel free to reach out