People Before Profit blog

Philly workers rally to defend contracts

Fri, 16 Jul 2004 03:32:00 +0000

PHILADELPHIA – The City Council’s passage of a $3.4 billion budget on June 11, a budget that includes steep cuts in a local income tax that funds many municipal services, has prompted anxiety and anger among city workers here. A July 7 rally involving over 2,000 city workers and their supporters highlighted their concerns and demanded fair contracts.

Several city contracts with the municipal unions are still being negotiated, and the projected drop in city revenue as a result of the cuts in the so-called wage tax – estimated at $50 million over five years – threatens to further undermine city workers’ wages, health benefits, and pensions. The cuts threaten to seriously jeopardize fire and police protection, as well.

“No concessions!” said Pete Matthews, president of AFSCME District Council 33, to the rally at Love Park. “Stop balancing the city’s budget on the backs of city workers.” Matthews questioned why the city can find money to build stadiums but can’t find money to pay for the wages and benefits of its workers.

Tom Cronin, president of AFSCME District Council 47, questioned why City Council and Mayor John Street agreed to more tax cuts when past cuts did not bring good paying jobs to the city or stop people from leaving.

“Tax cuts mean city workers will be asked to accept a contract that leaves them worse off,” said Cronin. “It means layoffs and reduction of health benefits and less pension security. We need to build a powerful coalition of union members and working people to make our political leaders demand that big business and the corporations pay their fair share for city services.”

Months ago, city residents were told by a blue-ribbon Tax Reform Commission that the tax cuts would make the Philadelphia more “competitive” in bringing businesses and jobs to the city and would result in economic growth and revitalization. In addition to cuts in the city’s wage tax, the commission’s original proposal also included sharp cuts in the business privilege tax.

Mayor Street countered by arguing that the proposed cuts would bankrupt the city and threatened to veto the entire budget. The City Council didn’t have enough votes to override his veto. By the deadline of July 1, a compromise was struck: The mayor agreed to cut the wage tax, but not the business privilege tax.

As a result, there will still be cuts in every department, but many services – such as recreation centers and pools, which had been slated to close – will be spared.

Others are not so lucky. The city has threatened to eliminate four ladder companies and four engine companies from the Fire Department. Les Yoast, a spokesman for Local 22 of the Philadelphia Firefighters Union, asked why the city would make such cuts when just two weeks ago firefighters from one of them had saved several lives in a fire. The union has gone to court to stop the closings and the court has ordered an investigation.

City workers whose unions are still in negotiation with the city have voted to strike if a fair contract is not offered soon. The police union, whose department is facing $4 million in cuts, is currently in binding arbitration with the city.

Several union leaders, including Jean Alexander, president of Transport Workers Union Local 234, John Gavin, United Food and Commercial Workers, and spokespeople for SEIU Local 36 and the American Postal Workers Union pledged their solidarity with the city workers. Support was also brought by NAACP President J. Whyatt Mondesire.

The author can be reached at phillyrose1@earthlink.net.

NYC labor to protest at GOP convention

Fri, 16 Jul 2004 03:24:00 +0000

NEW YORK – In a break from a more than 20-year tradition, this city’s labor movement will forego its usual celebratory parade and instead hold a Labor Day protest of the Bush administration in front of the Republican National Convention.

On Wednesday, Sept. 1, the New York City Central Labor Council (CLC) will hold what it describes as “a real Labor Day rally to stop Bush from destroying our jobs, healthcare, schools, right to organize, retirement security, and communities.”

Hundreds of people, representing the city’s various unions, packed the CLC hall July 13 for an organizing meeting. The delegates to the meeting discussed the nuts-and-bolts issues of organizing the rally, weaving in talk of the event’s national context and the need to defeat Bush in November.

“This year Labor Day is not a celebration – we’re not talking about celebrating Labor Day. We’re really talking about Labor Day being the beginning of a campaign to take back America,” said Michael J. Cavanaugh, deputy director of the Department of Field Mobilizations for the AFL-CIO, speaking on behalf of AFL-CIO President John Sweeney.

Calling the New York City operation “the kickoff for this year’s entire Labor Day campaign,” Cavanaugh said, “Over the course of the week, people in communities across America, especially in the battleground states, will be doing similar types of events – not big rallies, but similar types of events focusing on a very clear message – that this election season is about good jobs, is about health care, is about building strong communities, and why it is that we need to throw Bush out of office to accomplish these objectives.” He added that by the night of Sept. 2, when Bush is officially given the GOP nomination, the labor movement wants to have over 10,000 volunteers working in the battleground states.

“The labor movement is again coming out together united and strong, this time to send a message directly to the American people in Election 2004,” CLC President Brian McLaughlin told the gathering.

“That message is clear: George W. Bush is bad for the American workers. … Bush is bad on issue after issue for the American worker, not just trade union workers, but all workers.”

“We want this rally to give inspiration to those who are working to defeat Bush and Cheney all across the country,” said another speaker. “But most media outlets are controlled by people tied to the administration. The only way that we’re going to get their attention is by sheer numbers, turning out the tens of thousands. You’ve gotta go back and get your members involved!”

“Latino labor is going to be out there on Sept. 1 and we’re going to be joining with all of you,” said Sonya Ivaney, the new president of the Labor Council for Latin American Advancement. “It’s about time that we stand up and take America back. New York is going to be out there in force, all of us united as one, and we’re going to do it. We’re going to win together.”

The author can be reached at dmargolis@cpusa.org.

Midwest vote project in high gear

Thu, 15 Jul 2004 02:57:00 +0000

ST. LOUIS – This Fourth of July, activists from across the country joined activists here, workers to defeat George W. Bush in this battleground state. Communist Party USA (CPUSA) and Young Communist League (YCL) members, alongside friends and allies from Texas, California, New York, and everywhere in between, have been plugged into local political battles.

The goal of the CPUSA’s Midwest Project is to defeat Bush and the ultra-right in America’s heartland. Central to the Missouri part of the Midwest Project is helping to elect progressive, pro-labor candidates. Strengthening grassroots coalitions and building a broader movement to defeat Bush is tied directly into the efforts to build the Party and YCL.

In many parts of the nation the key issues are health care, jobs, education and a woman’s right to choose. Missouri is no different. Work during the primaries to elect candidates that will best represent these issues is part of the strategy in the fight to hold Democratic candidates accountable to voters’ needs.

In Missouri, many avidly anti-choice candidates currently hold office as Democrats. One such incumbent helped pull funding from women’s health programs that provided over 30,000 women with basic health care as well as contraceptives.

Similar to the rest of country, choice is used as a wedge issue in Missouri. This, along with gun control, has pushed rural Missouri, and therefore the state, to the Republicans in presidential races. St. Louis and Kansas City, however, are both highly Democratic cities that need more voters turning out and getting involved.

After Missouri, the Midwest Project workers will go to Ohio. Voter registration and mobilization is the focus of all the work. Activists from across the nation will travel to the heartland to help swing votes, and the more people participate, the greater the impact on the outcome of the 2004 elections on a local and national level.

To get involved in the Midwest Project, contactor ycl@yclusa.org. The team will be in Missouri until July 31, and moves on to Ohio Aug. 7.

Join others for a week, a weekend, or for a whole month to help elect, progressive, pro-labor candidates and defeat George W. Bush in November.

The author can be reached at dbuffington@cpusa.org.

Unions slam war, call for Bush ouster

Fri, 02 Jul 2004 02:09:00 +0000

SAN FRANCISCO – Delegates to conventions of two of the nation’s largest unions last week cheered as their leaders blasted George W. Bush for lying to justify war on Iraq and for torture of Iraqi detainees. Both unions called for Bush’s ouster in the Nov. 2 election and urged a fight to end the Republican majority grip on the House and Senate.

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney, speaking to 3,000 delegates of the 1.6-million-member Service Employees International Union (SEIU) here, was applauded when he said, “We have to say ‘No’ to government-sanctioned torture and to reckless politicians who send our loved ones off to fight wars on the basis of lies.”

The SEIU delegates unanimously approved a resolution decrying the deaths of thousands of Iraqis and hundreds of GIs in a war that has cost hundreds of billions in revenues needed at home. The resolution demanded that the U.S. “end the occupation of Iraq … by bringing our troops home safely, by not putting them recklessly in harm’s way, by providing adequate veterans’ benefits, and promoting domestic policies that prioritize the needs of working people.”

The resolution was introduced by seven SEIU locals, including New York’s Hospital and Health Care Local 1199, whose members marched against the Vietnam war in the 1960s and 1970s.

At about the same time in Anaheim, Calif., the 1.4-million-member American Federation of State County, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME) convention applauded union President Gerald McEntee when he blasted Bush for smearing critics of the war, according to Press Associates, Inc., a pro-union news service. “Real patriotism demands that you speak out and speak up when you disagree with your government,” McEntee said. “Thousands of American soldiers have been wounded in Iraq. Over 800 have died, including several from our own union. Our sympathies go out to their families. But the war in Iraq is one of many, many reasons we need a new president.”

AFSCME approved a resolution charging that Bush “lied to all of us – to the world – about the weapons of mass destruction and why we’re going to war in Iraq.”

Defeating the Bush administration and its allies in Congress was a theme running through both the AFSCME and SEIU conventions. SEIU is pledging to field 2,004 members to work full time in the battleground states, backed up by over 50,000 volunteers working in their home states during the campaign.

Sen. John Kerry, who refused to cross a picket line to speak to the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Boston, was among the guest speakers who addressed the SEIU convention.

In a ringing keynote on the official opening day, June 21, the union’s international president, Andrew Stern, called on delegates to “build a new circle of strength” through organizing especially in the South and Southwest, building “truly national unions” among hospital, long-term care, public service and building service workers, and together with other unions, strengthening labor’s ability to deal with global corporations. He also called for formation of the first “open source” virtual union – Purple Ocean – to link a million social and economic justice activists.

Stern singled out three multiservice outsourcing companies: French-based Sodexho, British-based Compass, and U.S.-based Aramark. Together, he said, they employ 1.1 million workers “and are growing so fast in cleaning, food service, laundry, transportation, maintenance and anything else that can be contracted out … that in a few years they will overtake Wal-Mart in size.” He called for the creation of the first real “global” union to confront this transnational giant.

Sweeney, who led the SEIU for many years, said, “George W. Bush is simply the worst president we’ve ever had to deal with. He and his cronies are as cold-blooded as bounty hunters when it comes to workers and our unions. All they care about is feeding our tax dollars to their wealthy supporters.”

Sweeney emphasized strengthening the labor movement. “We have to move faster and reach higher and build a bigger, stronger labor movement,” he said, to defeat corporate plunderers that drive down living standards around the world and routinely violate human rights at home, including denying workers the right to join together in a union.

Sweeney paid special tribute to the role of SEIU and its International Executive Vice President Eliseo Medina in stimulating the AFL-CIO to adopt its present position supporting the rights of immigrant workers. In his remarks to the convention, Medina called for global coordination of union campaigns and outlined a program for SEIU members to work with union members in other countries to deal with the growing challenge of the giant multiservice outsourcing corporations.

The author can be reached at mbechtel@pww.org. Joe Hancock, Kelly McConnell, and Tim Wheeler contributed to this article.click here for Spanish text