This year’s holidays got a bit brighter last Friday when the DC Nurses Association and its members donated over $1,000 in cash and presents to a hard-working, union mother of four to help her family enjoy the season. DCNA President LaKisha Little-Smalls, Board member Agnes Addington, Executive Director Ed Smith, Staff Attorney Walakewon Blegay and Membership & Finance Manager Veronica Scales were all on hand to present gifts to the family, which was burned out of their house and lost everything, and which the local adopted as part of the Metro Council’s Community Services Agency’s annual Holiday Basket program. Chuck Clay (right) has been re-elected president of IATSE Local 22, which represents area stagehands. First elected in 2002 and vice-president of the local, this will be Clay's fourth term as president. Clay conducted the recent negotiations that resulted in a new 4-year contract for stagehands at the Kennedy Center that includes an 8% wage increase (with 1% going to welfare). America's premier labor negotiator, William Julian Usery Jr., (at right, center) died in Eatonton, Georgia, on Saturday, Dec. 10. He was 92. "He understood deep in his veins how essential collective bargaining is to the American economy," said AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka. "He was a good man, and a good and well-respected friend of mine, and a man who taught me immensely about how to unravel tension and bring two warring sides together to reach a workable relationship." Read more on the AFL-CIO Now blog |