Broadcast on WPFW 89.3FM
Hosted by Chris Garlock and 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. HOUR 1: 1-2p Guests: Liz Davis, President, Washington Teachers Union, on the campaign to fully fund DC public schools; 4p rally today on Freedom Plaza. Roberta Lenoir, president, DCNA/UMC bargaining unit, on the East End Hospital. Clayton Rosenberg, Chief of Staff, Alliance of Concerned Men, on the East End Hospital. David Bayne, partner, Ashcraft & Gerel, on personal injury cases and the differences between Virginia and DC. Mark Gruenberg, Editor, Press Associates Union News Service on the latest labor news, including GOP Wash. State lawmaker’s idiotic remark about nurses playing cards pushes pro-nurses bill towards passage; Wide community support gives 31K Stop&Shop workers big win; NACOSH: Amazon, McDonald’s among ‘Dirty Dozen” top job safety and health violators HOUR 2: 2-3p Latest labor news, plus listener calls: 202-588-0893 The one benefit workers want more than anything L.A.’s Exotic Dancers Are Launching a Labor Movement This MLB power couple is fighting to save 200 union jobs The numbers behind workplace discrimination - Washington Post CREDITS: Produced by Chris Garlock; engineered by Mike Nasella. Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus.
0 Comments
Movies, music, art, history. Those may not be the first things that come to mind when you think of the labor movement, but the DC LaborFest aims to change that. The annual festival celebrates workers and their issues through the arts throughout the month of May, and is anchored by the DC Labor FilmFest, which has been screening films at the American Film Institute since 2001. This year’s LaborFest launches a week from today, beginning with a 3-hour May Day special right here on WPFW from 9a to 12 noon, and then we’ll screen “Support The Girls” – “A winning, rambunctious comedy about work in America” – at 7:15 that night at AFI. A line-up of more than 30 events follows, and you can get complete details on our website at dclabor.org. See you at LaborFest!
On this week’s labor calendar, join the Washington Teachers’ Union, parents, students, and others who care about funding, improving and saving our DC public schools tomorrow, April 25th, 4PM at Freedom Plaza to tell the DC mayor and city Council to “fully fund our public schools.” For all the latest local labor event listings, go to dclabor.org, and click on Calendar. In today’s labor history, on this date 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. On this date in 1999, the International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union halted shipping on the West Coast in solidarity with Abu-Jamal, a Philadelphia journalist who many believed was on death row because he was an outspoken African-American. After numerous appeals, his death penalty sentence was overturned by a Federal court, and in 2011, the prosecution agreed to a sentence of life imprisonment without parole. Mumia Abu-Jamal, who 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.” Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus. If you’re looking for ways to cut costs on medical expenses, check out the Union Plus Health Savings Program. Learn how you can save on vision, dental and prescription out-of-pocket expenses at unionplus.org/healthsavings. The United Food and Commercial Workers on Sunday announced that a tentative agreement was reached on a new contract for the 31,000 Stop & Shop workers who walked off their jobs on April 11.
The agreement preserves health care and retirement benefits, provides wage increases, and maintains time-and-a-half pay on Sunday for current members. “Today is a powerful victory for the 31,000 hardworking men and women of Stop & Shop who courageously stood up to fight for what all New Englanders want,” said the union, “good jobs, affordable health care, a better wage, and to be treated right by the company they made a success.” They added that “We are incredibly grateful to our customers and everyone who proudly stood together with us every day for a contract that invests in the communities we serve, and makes Stop & Shop a better place to work and a better place to shop." On this week’s labor calendar, join the Washington Teachers’ Union, parents, students, and others who care about funding, improving and saving our DC public schools this Thursday, April 25th, 4PM at Freedom Plaza to tell the DC mayor and city Council to “fully fund our public schools.” For all the latest local labor event listings, go to dclabor.org, and click on Calendar. In today’s labor history, on this date in 1956, the Canadian Labour Congress was founded 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. Today’s labor quote is by Ida Mae Stull, the country’s first woman coal miner, who died on this date in 1980. Ida Mae Stull, who said: “I can load five tons a day with pick and shovel and that’s as much as any man in the mines can do.” Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus. If you’re looking for ways to cut costs on medical expenses, check out the Union Plus Health Savings Program. Learn how you can save on vision, dental and prescription out-of-pocket expenses at unionplus.org/healthsavings. Ride-hail platform drivers in the metro DC region face financial debt, threats from customers, constantly changing rules that make calculating their earnings nearly impossible, and work hours that may make them a public safety hazard, according to a new Georgetown study.
Katie Wells, a post-doctoral fellow with Georgetown’s Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor, presented the report and its recommendations to the DC City Council last Thursday. The Uber workplace, said Wells, is “so full of gamification elements that it resembles a casino in which the gamblers – the drivers – often lose.” Recommendations include the creation of a publicly funded commission to study the impact of Transportation Network Companies such as Uber; establishing a prevailing wage for TNC drivers and requiring such companies to share data on their working conditions. Wells and study co-author Kafui Attoh (KA-FREE A-TO) discussed the report on last week’s Your Rights At Work; search for Union City Radio on your favorite podcast platform. For the latest local labor event listings, go to dclabor.org, and click on Calendar. In today’s labor history, on this date in 1938, one of the worst disasters in Virginia mining history occurred at the Red Jacket Coal Corporation mine near Grundy in Buchanan County. All 45 men in the mine at the time died when coal dust ignited, causing blasts that were felt two miles away. Today’s labor quote is by Kristen Johnson, a striking deli manager and UFCW Local 1445 shop steward at the Stop & Shop in Somerville, Massachusetts… “They want us to give up. They want us to quit. They want us to stop picketing and stop talking to our customers. We are not giving up.” Union City Radio is supported by our friends at Union Plus. If you’re looking for ways to cut costs on medical expenses, check out the Union Plus Health Savings Program. Learn how you can save on vision, dental and prescription out-of-pocket expenses at unionplus.org/healthsavings. |
Categories
All
Union City Radio is proud to be supported by UnionPlus, which has been working hard for union families since 1986.
Union City Radio is part of The Labor Radio/Podcast Network
Listen now...UC Radio airs weekdays at 7:15a on WPFW 89.3 FM; subscribe to the podcast here. |