Labor organizer and leader Bill Lucy “is a shining example of a trade unionist, and has inspired thousands of his brothers and sisters to continue to fight for a better tomorrow,” says the AFL-CIO, which last month presented him with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the AFL-CIO Martin Luther King Civil and Human Rights Conference. Born in Memphis, TN, Lucy worked for Contra Costa County in California as a materials and research engineer and in 1956, joined AFSCME Local 1675. A decade later, he was elected president of the Local and the next year, he left engineering to work full time for the labor union. He worked closely with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. during the Memphis sanitation strike in 1968 until King was assassinated later that year. The strike continued and the union won recognition... Click below to read more and for a chance to win one of 100 Black History Month posters. An estimated 200,000 Burmese migrants fuel Thailand’s huge fishing industry in Samut Sakhon province, an hour outside of Bangkok.The majority of workers are ethnic Mon from farming villages and they send their salaries to their families back home. Many workers do not hold legal documents and are vulnerable to exploitation by traffickers and lack access to legal protection. The Solidarity Center documents their struggles in a new photo essay published this week. photo by Jeanne Hallacy/Solidarity Center The IAM and the National Federation of Federal Employees (NFFE-IAM) are mourning the tragic death of NFFE-IAM Assistant General Counsel Philip Snodgrass, 27, who on Monday, February 23 was struck and killed by an erratic driver who drove off a street and onto a sidewalk in downtown Washington, DC...click below to read more. Calling it “a joke,” baggage handlers will protest Southwest’s “Airline of the Year” award Wednesday at 5:30p at the Omni Shoreham. “Air Transport World says ‘excellent labor relations’ is one of the criteria for receiving this award,” said Greg Puriski, a member of TWU 555 and a Southwest baggage handler who plans to be at the Washington protest. “They never asked us, that’s for sure. If they want to have better labor relations, let’s settle the contract.” Local 555, which represents more than 10,000 ground crew workers at Southwest Airlines, has been in negotiations with Southwest for a new contract since July 2011... photo courtesy Kelly Wilkinson/The Star |