ATU Local 689 earlier this week announced that it “strongly opposes” the bus service cuts proposed in WMATA’s next budget.
“At a time when we need to be expanding public transit offerings and working to get people out of their cars, WMATA seems to be moving in the wrong direction,” the union said. Local 689, which represents transit workers throughout the region, also called for the elimination of WMATA’s 3% budget cap. The cap prompted WMATA to hire Transdev to run its Cinder Bed Bus Garage as a way to restrict budget growth, and the private contractor treated the workers there so badly that they went on strike for 85 days, shutting down bus service for thousands of passengers in Northern Virginia. On this weekend’s labor calendar, Arise! Host Bill Fletcher will discuss “African-American Radicals and the American Labor Movement” tomorrow from 3 to 6pm at the Nicaraguan Embassy; for details and all the latest local labor events listings, go to dclabor.org and click on Calendar. For today’s labor history, I’m actually going to use something from tomorrow, in honor of Leap Year. On February 29, 1915, the legal minimum age for workers in mills, factories, and mines in South Carolina was raised from twelve to fourteen. Today’s labor quote is by Bruce Springsteen and Willie Nelson, who in December 1985, wrote a letter to 3M, the Minnesota Mining & Manufacturing Company, asking them not to shut down the company’s video and audio tape facility in Freehold, New Jersey, Springsteen’s hometown. ″We know that these decisions are always difficult to make,” Springsteen and Nelson wrote, “but we believe that people of good will should be able to sit down and come up with a humane program that will keep those jobs and those workers in Freehold.″ 3M went ahead with their plans and on February 28, 1986, in response to the layoff of 450 union members at the factory in New Jersey, every worker at a 3M factory in South Africa, walked off the job in sympathy. Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus. Did you know that union members can save up to 25% on car rentals with Union Plus. Break your cabin fever and book a car rental now to get your union discount. Visit unionplus.org/carrental to get started. You can also support Union City Radio and WPFW by contributing during our Winter Pledge Drive; call 202-588-9739 or pledge online at wpfwfm.org. Thank you so much!
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Safeway’s refusal to fully fund pensions for its workers has become the main sticking point in contract negotiations, reports UFCW Local 400.
The union has met with Safeway negotiators twice this week but reports no progress on the key pension issue. In the meantime, Local 400 is continuing to prepare for a strike at Safeway. They’re distributing letters to neighboring businesses at shopping centers to ask for their support and to inform them that picket lines will appear in front of Safeway stores if a strike is called. A strike vote is scheduled for March 5, when union members will also vote on the tentative contract agreement already reached with Giant. On today’s labor calendar, tune in at 1 o’clock this afternoon right here on WPFW when our guest on this week’s edition of Your Rights At Work will be Hamilton Nolan, the new labor columnist at In These Times. For all the latest local labor events listings, go to dclabor.org and click on Calendar. In today’s labor history, on this date in 1939, the Supreme Court ruled that sit-down strikes, a major organizing tool for industrial unions, were illegal. Today’s labor quote is by Eugene Victor Debs, the legendary labor leader and socialist presidential candidate who became a charter member and secretary of the Vigo Lodge at the Brotherhood of Locomotive Firemen on this date in 1875. Five years later he was leading the national union and in 1893 helped found the nation’s first industrial union, the American Railway Union. Gene Debs, who said: “While there is a lower class, I am in it; while there is a criminal element, I am of it; while there is a soul in prison, I am not free.” Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus. Did you know that union members can save up to 25% on car rentals with Union Plus. Break your cabin fever and book a car rental now to get your union discount. Visit unionplus.org/carrental to get started. You can also support Union City Radio and WPFW by contributing during our Winter Pledge Drive; call 202-588-9739 or pledge online at wpfwfm.org. Thank you so much! Hosted by Chris Garlock, with Ed Smith
DC’s call-in show about worker rights: those you have, those you don’t, how to get them and how to use them. On today's show: DR. LONNIE GOLDEN on the Part-Time Workers Bill of Rights Plus: U.S. Soccer’s new defense in equal pay case: Blame the women’s union and Union study finds Black Starbucks baristas in airports paid less than whites Case Closed, with BOB SAMET, Senior Partner at Ashcraft and Gerel Produced by Chris Garlock; engineered by Mike Nasella Calling it “just another step toward the administration’s goal of busting unions,” the American Federation of Government Employees – the largest federal union – last week blasted the Federal Labor Relations Authority’s recent decision regarding union-dues deductions.
The union said the decision will make it “even harder for rank-and-file federal employees to speak up, defend their rights, and serve the American people” adding that “It’s part of a pattern of behavior by this administration that shows no respect for federal employees’ voluntary choice, their union contracts, or their rights under the law.” “They may try to silence us,” AFGE National Secretary-Treasurer Everett Kelley said, “but they can never stop organized federal employees from standing up and speaking out for a better life for their families and the public we serve.” For the latest local labor calendar of events, go to dclabor.org and click on Calendar. In today’s labor history, on this date in 2004, a 20-week strike by 70,000 Southern California supermarket workers ended, with both sides claiming victory. Today’s labor quote is by Reverend George W. Lee, the Mississippi civil rights activist who was murdered in 1955, just a month after he rallied black voters, saying "Pray not for your mom and pop. They've gone to heaven. Pray you can make it through this hell." Reverend George W. Lee is one of the African American leaders and activists profiled by the AFL-CIO for Black History Month; we’ve got a link to their write-up on our website at dclabor.org, click on Union City Radio. Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus. Did you know that union members can save up to 25% on car rentals with Union Plus. Break your cabin fever and book a car rental now to get your union discount. Visit unionplus.org/carrental to get started. You can also support Union City Radio and WPFW by contributing during our Winter Pledge Drive; call 202-588-9739 or pledge online at wpfwfm.org. Thank you so much! |
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