The week in US unions, September 3rd-10th, 2022

This week’s newsletter is dedicated to the memory of Tim Schermerhorn, who passed away this week. Tim was one of the guiding lights of Labor Notes, and was a champion of militant, democratic unionism in TWU Local 100, New York City’s transit union, and the broader fight for justice. You can read him in his own words here.

STRIKES & NEGOTIATIONS

The Minnesota Nurses Association has launched one of the largest nurses strikes in US history, as 15,000 workers walked off the job for the first of three days. NUHW’s 2,000 mental healthcare workers have now been on strike for a month in Northern California and a smaller group in Hawaii. A couple thousand nurses who were set to strike for recognition with SEIU Healthcare Wisconsin at the University of Wisconsin health system in Madison, WI got a governor-brokered deal that sounds like it doesn’t grant recognition but refers it to a legal process and non-binding talks in exchange for not striking (which sounds extremely fluffy and question-begging to me, but I’m way out of the loop on this one). Nursing home workers with SEIU Healthcare Pennsylvania settled a contract after a week on strike.

Education: If it weren’t for the Minnesota nurses, the Seattle teachers strike would be the largest in the country, as a fourth school day passes with over 6,000 educators on the picket line. Strike fever appears to have spread over a good chunk of Washington state, with strikes popping up in Ridgefield, WA, Eatonville, WA, and Tumwater, WA. In higher education, the 500 members of Eastern Michigan University’s AAUP-AFT local struck and won a tentative agreement (helped by a judge refusing to grant an injunction against them).

Dwarfing both of those is the potential work stoppage on the freight railroads, as negotiations covering 115,000 workers go right up to the deadline, which isn’t really a deadline but is being treated as such, in large part because, as has become especially clear in the past week or so, the primary “threat” behind a rail work stoppage is a lockout, not a strike? Why do I say that? Let us count the ways. Ten of rail unions officially have tentative agreements based on Biden’s Presidential Emergency Board (PEB) recommendations. Of the two that don’t, only one has publicly authorized a strike by membership vote, and that was two months ago, and there’s been no other widespread picketing or strike assignments or anything else that would signal a serious plan to walk. The GOP has already written a bill to impose the PEB recommendations in case of a work stoppage, which recommendations the employers were extremely quick to praise when they came out in August. Oh, and the carriers have basically already started locking down, with service reductions on pretexts of safety (BLET and SMART-TD put a statement out against this “corporate extortion”), which has had a knock-on effect on Amtrak (not part of the negotiations but of course impacted by rail operations), all of which should not be allowed since we’re still legally in a “cooling-off period” but seems to be not even registering with the rail unions’ supposed allies at the top of the Democratic Party, with Steny Hoyer saying just that “obviously a railroad strike at this point in time would be extraordinarily detrimental to our economy and the American people,” with no mention of a lockout (or any of the issues workers are facing, such as uncapped rising healthcare costs, zero sick days, inhumane scheduling issues, and rapidly deteriorating working conditions), and saying that Congress will intervene to avert a strike which basically neuters the last best option remaining for rail workers. Apparently the Biden admin is spooked and making frantic calls.

UAW: Around 1,000 autoworkers at the Stellantis Casting Plant in Kokomo, IN struck for three days with UAW Local 1166 over terms of the local agreement (as opposed to the national contract, which expires next year) having to do with safety and working conditions; the ratified agreement includes everything from installing air conditioning to taking union input on plant layout to cleaning the microwaves in the break room. Meanwhile, workers at the new Ultium car battery plant in Lordstown, OH have voted overwhelmingly to authorize a recognition strike, after 85% of workers signed cards to join UAW Local 1112. Ultium is a GM joint venture with LG, and in May, the UAW said the company rejected a card check agreement. Recognition strikes remain by far the exception rather than the rule (both in terms of being an uncommon type of strike, and uncommon method for new organizing) but the UAW won a sizeable recognition strike last year at a Stellantis joint venture auto parts plant in Michigan, so they may go for it, and may pull it off. Elsewhere in the union, UAW Local 2300 members at Cornell University in Ithaca, NY voted down a contract offer, as did Molson Coors workers in Milwaukee with Brewery Workers Local 9 (I assume their UAW affiliation is from some decades-ago merger0.

Workers who’ve been on strike at DHL in Pawtucket, RI since June were arrested for exercising basic first amendment rights– er, ‘disorderly conduct’ – including a leader of Teamsters Local 251. In June, armed guards from the company threatened union leaders with a baseball bat.

POLITICS & LEGISLATION

Elizabeth Warren and Brad Sherman (in the House) have introduced a bill to eliminate section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act, which is to say ban state-level “right to work” laws. This was one of the many attractive components of the PRO Act, but hasn’t been much talked about. I say this every time right to work comes up in the newsletter, but my sense is it’s better understood as a tailing indicator of union weakness rather than a determinant, but ending right-to-work is also a widely-felt signature demand among millions of union members, so would be a really good tool to rally the base if they were to pass it, say, before a very close and consequential election, but it also might upset a small business owner who was never in a million years going to vote for Tim Ryan anyway, so I assume the Democrats won’t go all-in. Or we could just do “force the vote” on the PRO Act.

The House Education & Labor Committee will hold a hearing on corporate union-busting featuring leaders of Starbucks Workers United and the fantastic Kate Bronfenbrenner, one of the best analysts of NLRB elections and new organizing data. It’s a welcome move, though we all still deserve to get to watch Howard Schultz squirm on TV.

The NLRB has proposed a new joint employer rule (this would make it so that parent companies, and especially those who subcontract or franchise out operations, would be liable for the employment behavior of their underlings) which is very welcome, though my sense is this is a long process that could take longer than the political support it has at the Board, as happened under Obama when that Board made a similar move.

INTERNAL UNION POLITICS

The AFL-CIO has gained an affiliate in the MLBPA, which I guess was not already affiliated (though the NFL and Women’s Soccer unions are). But the federation could lose an affiliate if the merger that the APA and ALPA are considering goes through (ok I don’t think they would leave, especially since ALPA is much bigger and is in the AFL but I needed the symmetry for this section).

And there’s nothing exactly to report yet, but a new reform effort has launched (on social media, but there are real people behind it; I’m working on a story on it now, so if you’re a member and have thoughts, I’d love to hear them) in the UFCW ahead of their April 2023 convention; they’re calling for one member, one vote, and other union democracy reforms which, if successful, could be a major shakeup in one of the country’s largest unions.

NEW ORGANIZING

New election filings at the NLRB: 700 (!) poultry plant workers at Peco Foods in West Point, MS (!) are organizing with UFCW Local 1529; it will be the second-largest vote in the state in at least the past 15 years (as far as easily-accessible online NLRB records go back), only behind the ill-fated UAW drive at Nissan in 2017. 160 industrial laundry workers for Cooperative Laundry in Kearny, NJ are unionizing with Teamsters Local 560; I believe this is the same facility where Workers United lost an election in early 2021, and worth noting that Workers United filed a ULP on the same day that the Teamsters filed for an election this week? Odd. Curious if anyone has the back story. 115 cement truck drivers for Titan Concrete in Fort Lauderdale, FL are unionizing with Teamsters Local 769; another 55 concrete workers at Lehigh Hanson, one of the companies that was part of the massive Seattle area concrete strike, are organizing in Sumner, WA with Teamsters Local 174. 110 workers at Northridge Health and Rehab in New Hope, MN are organizing with SEIU Healthcare Minnesota. 99 hospital techs at Whittier Hospital in Whittier, CA are unionizing with NUHW. The museum organizing wave has spread to Columbus, OH where 97 Columbus Museum of Art employees are organizing with AFSCME Council 8. 

Smaller shops: Here’s an odd one: the 59 staff members of the New Jersey Coalition of Automotive Retailers, an employers’ group in Ewing, NJ, are unionizing with CWA. 44 sanitation workers at Prairieland Disposal in Wauconda, IL are organizing with Teamsters Local 301. 25 Starbucks workers in Abington, PA and 15 in Breckenridge, CO have filed to join Workers United, and the seven Starbucks workers in a Fred Meyer (so, technically Fred Meyer employees, despite the green aprons and so forth) in Anchorage, AK are joining UFCW Local 1496. The 37 employees of the Wall Street Journal’s photo department are unionizing with the Independent Association of Publishers’ Employees (NewsGuild CWA Local 1096). 38 dispensary workers at Windy City Cannabis in Homewood, IL are joining UFCW Local 881, 16 dispensary workers at Strawberry Fields in Pueblo, CO are unionizing with UFCW Local 7, and six more at Power Plants in Portland, OR are joining UFCW Local 555; eight deli department workers at Roth’s Fresh Markets in Salem, OR are also joining UFCW Local 555. 36 EMTs in Susanville, CA are organizing with the Steelworkers. 30 social services workers at Arc of Southington in Plantsville, CT are unionizing with SEIU 1199 New England. 27 workers at IsoRay, a cancer treatment provider in Richland, WA, are joining UFCW Local 3000. 20 workers at Gatwood Crane Service in Arlington Heights, IL are unionizing with Operating Engineers Local 150. 18 cooks and housekeepers at Pioneer Ridge nursing home in Lawrence, KS are unionizing with Teamsters Local 696. 15 warehouse workers for medical equipment supplier Landauer Medstar in the Bronx, NY are joining IBEW Local 1430, and 15 building services workers nearby at 200 Amsterdam on the Upper West Side are joining SEIU 32BJ. Nine workers at screen printing shop Crushin’ It Apparel in Madison, WI are unionizing with Painters Local 770. Nine subcontracted clerical workers at Fort Sill, OK are joining Operating Engineers Local 351. Six meter techs for People’s Gas in Pikeville, KY are joining the Utility Workers.

NLRB election wins…: 121 workers at the New Seasons grocery store on Division Street in Portland, OR voted 62-17 to join the independent New Seasons Labor Union, proving that independent unionism is the future of the labor movement. 106 nursing home workers at SKLD in Bloomfield Hills, MI narrowly won their union with SEIU Healthcare Michigan in a 25-21 vote. 83 healthcare workers for Cape Regional Physicians Associates in Cape May County, NJ voted 38-27 to join UFCW Local 152. Just one Starbucks had their union vote last week, in Roseville, MN, where 28 workers voted 7-5 to join Workers United. 23 workers at the Everett, WA Daily Herald voted 18-0 to join the Pacific Northwest NewsGuild. In Ferndale and Bellingham, WA, 18 workers at Cadman, the concrete company that was part of the epic Seattle-area concrete strike, voted 9-5 to join Teamsters Local 231. 15 workers for Japanese goods importer Jalux in San Jose, CA voted 7-5 to join UFCW Local 5. Seven subcontracted clericals for CT Transit (but employed by HNS Management) in Hartford, CT voted 5-0 to join ATU Local 425. 

…and losses: 95 workers at the New Seasons grocery store on Tacoma Street in Portland, OR voted 29-33 against joining the independent New Seasons Labor Union, proving that independent unionism has no future in the labor movement. UA Local 525 got trounced, 1-14, in an election among 21 plumbers at Las Vegas contractor Universal Plumbing & Heating. 14 clericals at the huge Kroger warehouse in Memphis voted 3-6 not to join Teamsters Local 667, who represent the rest of the warehouse workers there. All four workers at fire department equipment supplier Fire Service in Naperville, IL voted against joining Machinists Local 701. Two building maintenance workers in Philadelphia aren’t joining SMART Local 19 after the one who voted voted no.

Decertifications and raids: 53 nursing home workers at Pine Creek Care Center in Roseville, CA dropped Teamsters Local 150 in a low turnout 3-11 vote. 48 workers at the Omaha Steel Castings Company in Wahoo, NE held onto their union, Iron Workers Local 853 in a 13-9 vote (wahoo indeed). 16 mechanics for Waste Management of Kentucky in Louisville dropped UAW Local 3058, 4-7. Six publicists at ABC in NYC decertified NABET-CWA Local 16, 0-3. 

But this is just one of those weeks where most of the most exciting new organizing news happened outside the NLRB, especially at big employers. Amazon workers in the Moreno Valley, CA announced their intention to unionize with the Amazon Labor Union. A local reporter in Buffalo broke the news that workers are forming an independent union in a 2600-worker unit at GEICO, and today those workers filed ULPs against the company for sending union-busting emails. And speaking of ULPs at large non-union employers, Target workers in Pueblo, CO have filed charges against the company for interfering with their union organizing efforts. Oh and the MLBPA announced they had gotten something like 6,000 union cards signed among minor leaguers, and the bosses decided they’d better voluntarily recognize them. UNITE HERE’s organizing of 4,000 subcontracted Google dining workers during the pandemic in 23 cities was made public, and, not satisfied with taking on our shadow technological state, they went for the financial overlords as well, with UNITE HERE Local 100 picketing at the Federal Reserve in NYC for a contract. Michael Sainato has the story of VFX film/tv workers who are seeking to unionize with IATSE (part of the long tail of the near-miss IATSE strike of last Striketober). Over 500 media workers won recognition with the New York NewsGuild as part of the company-wide Conde Nast Union after a private card check vote. And this one is NLRB, but not officially recorded yet; baristas at 17 Heine Bros coffee locations in and around Louisville won their election to join 32BJ SEIU (actually I think technically the Kentucky-based National Conference of Firemen and Oilers, which is an old craft rail union (yes, part of the potential national rail strike) that is for some reason affiliated to 32BJ which at one point was a building services union in New York City). The staff of ActBlue is unionizing with CODE CWA, and is requesting voluntary recognition.

And to take us out on a beautiful note, read Eric Blanc’s interview with the workers who organized the first-ever Chipotle union in Lansing, MI with Teamsters Local 243. Lots to learn here.