News: The National Transportation Safety Board has invited two representatives from ATU Local 689 to participate in the investigation into last week’s incident and fatality at L’Enfant Plaza. Local 689 Assistant Business Agent for Safety Jim Madaras and Local 689 Assistant Business Agent for Rail Operations Marlene Flemmings-McCann will be working with WMATA leadership and the NTSB on a full investigation of the cause of the incident. The union “sends our heartfelt condolences to the passenger who passed away,” said Local 689 President Jackie Jeter. “We also wish a speedy recovery to all those who were injured in that fire.” Local 689 “is committed to safe and reliable transportation for all Metro riders and employees,” Jeter added.
Here’s today’s labor history: On this date in 1909, a fire broke out during construction of a water tunnel for the city of Chicago, burning the wooden dormitory housing the tunnel workers. While 46 survived the fire by jumping into the frigid lake and climbing onto ice floes, approximately 60 men died, 29 burned beyond recognition and the others drowned. In 1920, the American Civil Liberties Union was founded. On this date in 1934, the Nazis adopted the “Act on the Regulation of National Labor,” replacing independently negotiated collective agreements. In 1961, Mickey Mantle signed a new contract with the New York Yankees making him the highest paid player in baseball: $75,000 for the entire 1961 season. Today’s labor quote is by baseball player Curt Flood: “Baseball as you know it now and as I knew it then was two different things. It was just pitiful. We had no association, we were making no money, and every time we went into the bosses office, we had to kind of crawl in and beg for a few dollars more. You have to understand that to know why someone would do what I did.” Curt Flood was a St Louis Cardinals centerfielder whose challenge of baseball’s reserve clause in 1969 helped lead to the labor liberation of professional athletes.
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News: After a 13-day strike, trash haulers employed by Unity Disposal in Montgomery and Howard counties have ratified a new four-year contract. The contract provides immediate pay raises for all Unity drivers and helpers, increases paid time off, ensures that employees who work extra routes will now get paid more for that extra work, and provides a grievance procedure that puts into writing a fair disciplinary policy. “We couldn’t have done with this without each other,” said Unity driver Rosa Avalos. “And we couldn’t have done it without the support of our families, supportive residents along our trash routes, and union members from across the region and country.”
Here’s this week's Labor Quiz: Most folks know that Martin Luther King Jr. was a Baptist minister, social activist, and leader in the American civil rights movement who was assassinated in 1968 while helping striking sanitation workers in Memphis. But did you know his birth name was not Martin? Was it Carl, Kenneth, Michael, Thomas, or none of these? Go to unionist.com and click on Labor Quiz to submit your answer and you could be this week’s winner! Here’s today’s labor history: On this date in 1920, some 3,000 members of the Filipino Federation of Labor struck the plantations of Oahu, Hawaii. Their ranks swelled to more than 8,000 as they were joined by members of the Japanese Federation of Labor. In 1986, Bruce Springsteen made a surprise appearance at a benefit for laid-off 3M workers in Asbury Park, New Jersey. Today’s labor quote is from Bruce Springsteen’s 1986 hit “My Hometown”: Now Main Street's whitewashed windows and vacant stores Seems like there ain't nobody wants to come down here no more They're closing down the textile mill across the railroad tracks Foreman says these jobs are going boys and they ain't coming back to your hometown Following the AFL-CIO’s first National Summit on Raising Wages last week, the Metro Washington Council AFL-CIO and the metro-area labor movement will launch a campaign later this year aimed at creating an economy that works for everyone. “The National Summit on Raising Wages laid clear the challenges – but more importantly, the opportunities – facing DC-area families,” said Metro Washington Council President Jos Williams. “Allies united behind the idea of a Raising Wages Agenda have come together in a collective voice, and are ready to get to work,” Williams said.
Here’s today’s labor history: On this date in 1883, the United States Civil Service Commission was established as the Pendleton Act went into effect In 1920, thousands of Palmer Raids detainees – many of them union organizers -- won the right to meet with lawyers and have legal representation at deportation hearings. Today’s labor quote is from a 1955 ad in Boston newspapers protesting strikebreakers hiring practices by Colonial Provision Company and Boston Sausage Company: “What kind of job is it where you take the bread and butter off a fellow workers table? Colonial is getting its few strikebreakers by paying Judas money to a few know-nothings to bring in their friends. Tell them you don’t want their dirty thirty pieces of silver.” Chanting “It’s not that cold, we won’t fold!” several dozen Washington Post workers and their supporters picketed outside the Post on Tuesday. “We’re making some progress but the major issues are still before us,” said the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild’s Rick Ehrmann. Representatives of the Post and Guild met January 7 and reached tentative agreement on several issues. The Guild reported last week that management had dropped a poison pill proposal that could have made it difficult for the union to collect membership dues.
This followed progress made in the previous session on job security and evaluations, but pensions, wages and health benefits are still on the table. Here’s today’s labor history: On this date in 1915, Ralph Chaplin, in Chicago for a demonstration against hunger, completed writing the labor anthem “Solidarity Forever.” A member of the IWW, Chaplin had begun writing the song in 1914 during a miners’ strike in Huntington, West Virginia. In 1919, seventeen workers died when a large molasses storage tank in Boston’s North End neighborhood burst, sending a 40-foot wave of molasses surging through the streets at an estimated 35 miles per hour. In all, 21 people died and 150 were injured. The incident is variously known as the Boston Molasses Disaster, the Great Molasses Flood and the Great Boston Molasses Tragedy. Some residents claim that on hot summer days, the area still smells of molasses. On this date in 1929, Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. was born. In 1938, the CIO miners' union in California’s Grass Valley area struck for higher wages, union recognition, and the 8-hour day. The strike was defeated when vigilantes and law enforcement officials expelled 400 miners and their families from the area. Today’s labor quote is the first verse of Ralph Chaplin’s song, “Solidarity Forever,” which has been sung at countless labor struggles over the last 100 years: When the union's inspiration through the workers' blood shall run, There can be no power greater anywhere beneath the sun; Yet what force on earth is weaker than the feeble strength of one, But the union makes us strong |
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