Labor in the News (8/7/08)

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)
Teacher Lobbying by Outside Group Raises Ire of DC Teachers: DC teachers and their union, the Washington Teachers Union (WTU) Local 6, are accusing a newly-created community group of inappropriately interfering in the ongoing teacher contract negotiations, reported Bill Turque in Wednesday’s Washington Post. The group, which has members with past ties to School Chancellor Michelle Rhee, has hired teachers to lobby co-workers to support the Chancellor’s controversial pay-for-performance plan that would end tenure rights for workers who take it. "We think it's inappropriate to interfere with the union's communications with its membership about a future contract," Local 6 President George Parker told the Post. Teachers have also voiced concern that Chancellor Rhee’s ties to the group may indicate she had a role in orchestrating the lobbying campaign. Click here to read the full story. Postal Workers Still Without Answers After 2001 Anthrax Attack: Recent developments in the investigation of the 2001 Anthrax attacks that killed five people, including two DC postal workers, has rekindled anger among DC Postal workers about the way they were treated after the attacks, reported V. Dion Haynes and Michelle Boorstein in Sunday’s Washington Post. “Management has not explained why it allowed the facility to remain open even though it knew about the contamination and why officials did not apologize to employees for possibly putting them at risk,” Dena Briscoe, President of the American Postal Workers Union Nation's Capital and Southern Maryland Local, told the Post. “People are upset that the victims did not receive the emotional and financial support given to those who suffered in other national tragedies, she said.” Click here to read the full story.