More than two dozen housekeeping and dietary workers at Arcola Health and Rehabilitation Center voted last month to join 1199SEIU. “I have worked at Arcola as a laundry aide for over 18 years,” said Vicki Watson. “For the past five years we have had no pay raises, health insurance or benefits whatsoever. Retirement is on my mind. I have put too much into this company to walk out with no retirement package and be homeless.” Over 900 workers have voted to join 1199SEIU so far in 2015, with caregivers from the Maryland/DC area to Upstate New York affirming the need for affordable healthcare, better pay and a voice in patient care.
There are still a few openings for volunteers at the 2015 DC LaborFest, which launches this Friday, May 1. Volunteers get a LaborFest t-shirt and free Labor FilmFest passes. The 2015 DC LaborFest runs May 1-31 and has more than 50 exciting events scheduled, including the 15th annual DC Labor FilmFest, plus labor art, music, book, history and even soccer events. Go to dclabor.org and click on LaborFest to sign up. On today's labor calendar, the Good Jobs for All Campaign Launch with Senator Elizabeth Warren starts at 8am at the Carnegie Library; go to dclabor.org and click on calendar for complete details. In today's labor history, Coxey’s Army of 500 unemployed civil war veterans reached Washington, on this date in 1894; and in 1899, an estimated one thousand silver miners, angry over low wages, the firing of union members and the planting of spies in their ranks by mine-owners, seized a train, loaded it with 3,000 pounds of dynamite, and blew up the mill at the Bunker Hill mine in Wardner, Idaho. In 1943, the special representative of the National War Labor Board issued a report setting forth provisions for wage rates for women working in war industries who were demanding equal pay. Today's labor quote is by Beyoncé, who said: "We need to stop buying into the myth about gender equality. It isn’t a reality yet. Today, women make up half of the U.S. workforce, but the average working woman earns only 77 percent of what the average working man makes. But unless women and men both say this is unacceptable, things will not change. Men have to demand that their wives, daughters, mothers, and sisters earn more—commensurate with their qualifications and not their gen der. Equality will be achieved when men and women are granted equal pay and equal respect."
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More than a thousand activists marched and danced through DC streets Monday as they made their way from the AFL-CIO to the offices of the US Trade Representative, where police re-routed traffic as the demonstrators made clear their opposition to the Fast Track trade legislation now being rushed through Congress. The usual contingents of union members were joined by young activists in town for the Populism2015 conference, who led the way with spirited chants and raised fists. Populist Jim Hightower cut to the core of the issue when he said that “The only thing you need to know about Fast Track is that they don’t want you to know about it!” Monday’s rally followed another well-attended rally on Capitol Hill last week, and opposition has been building across the country. NOVA Labor phone-bankers made over 1,000 calls to Congress last Saturday, and the phonebank will be open in Annandale all week.
Also on today's labor calendar, the DC Young Trade Unionists are holding an "after-summit" happy hour tonight at 6pm at Kelly's Irish Times, and there's a Just Hours Campaign Canvass starting at 6pm at the Archives Metro Station. Go to dclabor.org and click on calendar for complete details. In today's labor history, the Canadian Labour Congress was founded on this date in 1956 through a merger of the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada and the Canadian Congress of Labour, the two major union congresses in Canada at the time. The CLC represents the interests of more than three million affiliated workers. In 1980, Ida Mae Stull died; she was nationally recognized as the country’s first woman coal miner. And on this date in 1993, United Farm Workers of America founder Cesar Chavez died in San Luis, Arizona at the age of 66. Today's labor quote is by Cesar Chavez, who said: “The fight is never about grapes or lettuce. It is always about people.” Cesar Chavez, who also said that “You are never strong enough that you don't need help.” Maryland Governor Larry Hogan is “very seriously” considering implementing furloughs of state employees, reports AFSCME Maryland. The Legislature adopted budget language which “fenced off” the funds for the 2 percent pay raise that all state and university workers began receiving in January, so Hogan can’t use the pay raise money for any other spending. But Hogan “can choose to simply not spend the money at all and state employee’s pay would be cut,” AFSCME Maryland warns.
And in Montgomery County, officials are investigating allegations by employees at the Department of Economic Development that acting director Sally Sternbach has fostered a hostile work environment marked by “persistent inappropriate and intimidating behavior,” reported the Washington Post last week. The charges were contained in an April 6 letter to County Executive Isiah Leggett from Gino Renne, president of UFCW Local 1994, the Municipal and County Government Employees Organization, which represents about half of the 40 employees in the department. On today's labor calendar, NOVA Labor's Stop Fast Track Phonebank runs today and tomorrow starting at 10am in Annandale, VA and at 7:30 tonight there's a Stop Fast Track Town Hall at the Cedar Lane Unitarian Church in Bethesda; go to dclabor.org and click on calendar for complete details. In today's labor history, The International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union on this date in 1999 halted shipping on the West Coast in solidarity with Mumia Abu-Jamal, a Philadelphia journalist who many believed was on death row because he was an outspoken African-American. And in 2013, an eight-story building housing garment factories in Dhaka, Bangladesh collapsed, killing 1,129 workers and injuring 2,515. A day earlier cracks had been found in the structure, but factory officials, who had contracts with Benneton and other major U.S. labels, insisted the workers return to the job the next day. Today's labor quote is by Mumia Abu-Jamal, who said: "Politics is the art of making the people believe that they are in power, when in fact, they have none." Mumia Abu-Jamal, who also said: "When a cause comes along and you know in your bones that it is just, yet refuse to defend it -- at that moment you begin to die." Bargaining between the Washington-Baltimore Newspaper Guild and The Washington Post is “at a standstill,” reports the Guild. Even worse, publisher Fred Ryan, “in a strikingly tone-deaf email, crowed about the company's performance while announcing some staff reductions in commercial operations," says the Guild, which recently released a video in which Post workers express their frustration with the Post’s demands for cuts and takebacks. “Journalists don’t have an off-button, we don’t go home at the end of the day and stop being journalists,” says Post art critic Phillip Kennicott, “so it’s important for the new ownership of the Post to understand what a deep reservoir of value in its people it has.” Check out the Guild video on our website at dclabor.org.
On today’s labor calendar, Good Jobs Nation is holding a "Rally for Good Jobs" starting at 9:30am at Massachusetts and D St NE. The Stop Fast Track Phonebank continues at NoVA Labor this morning at 10am in Annandale, and then at 11am there’s a Homegoing Celebration at St. Stephens Baptist Church in Temple Hills for Rolene McKnight, the Metro Washington Council’s former receptionist. Go to dclabor.org and click on calendar for complete details. In today’s labor history, songwriter, musician and activist Hazel Dickens died at age 75 on this date in 2011. Among her songs: “They’ll Never Keep Us Down” and “Working Girl Blues.” Today’s labor quote is by cultural blogger John Pietaro: "Hazel Dickens didn’t just sing the anthems of labor, she lived them. Her place on many a picket line, staring down gunfire and goon squads, embedded her into the cause." |
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