Poor Verizon. In contract negotiations with the Communications Workers of America and the Electrical Workers, the telecom giant says it just doesn’t have the money to settle a contract with nearly 40,000 workers from Virginia to Massachusetts. That’s why it wants to cut pay for workers hurt on the job, hit workers with big increases in health care costs and get rid of good jobs. Meanwhile, Verizon made nearly $10 billion in profits last year, and is doing even better this year. Recognizing that it’s hard to make it on just $1 billion in profits every month, CWA has launched a new website, GoFundVerizon.com, where you can donate to a new yacht for Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam, a new Jacuzzi for the company’s corporate jet or a raise for top execs. Don’t worry, this isn’t crowdfunding for the 1%; the union doesn’t want you to actually contribute to this greedy corporation, just show how ordinary folks are paying attention to this struggle for jobs with justice.
Here's Today’s Labor Calendar: The transit workers’ WMATA-ville continues today from 10 am to 5 pm at the Transdev garage in Hyattsville, Maryland. Tomorrow, NoVA Labor’s precinct walks and phone banks start at 10 am at NoVa labor’s offices in Annandale, Virginia. Go to dclabor.org and click on calendar for complete details. Here’s today’s labor history: On this date in 2001, more than 3,000 people died when suicide highjackers crashed planes into the World Trade Center towers, the Pentagon and a Pennsylvania field. Among the dead in New York were 634 union members, the majority of them New York City firefighters and police on the scene when the towers fell. And in 2009, Crystal Lee Sutton, the real-life Norma Rae of the movies, died at age 68. She worked at a J.P. Stevens textile plant in Roanoke Rapids, North Carolina, when low pay and poor working conditions led her to become a union activist. Today’s labor quote is by Crystal Lee Sutton, recalling the moment that changed her life — and later elevated the lives of thousands of textile workers – and was immortalized by Sally Field in the 1979 film, “Norma Rae”. About to be fired for trying to organize, she told her supervisors she had to go back in the plant to get her purse: "I got a piece of cardboard that we used to put in our towel gift sets," Sutton said. "I just grabbed (a magic marker), and I just wrote the word 'union' on that piece of cardboard and climbed on the table. I don't even know how I got up there. And I held that word 'union' up — that cardboard — and turned it around. And people — they finally all shut their machines down."
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Union City Radio’s Chris Garlock and the Employment Justice Center’s Hannah Kane discuss worker rights with local activists/organizers and take listener calls.
Guests on today’s show include Todd Brogan, Field Mobilization Specialist for the Amalgamated Transit Union, discussing working conditions and a series of actions ATU is organizing to increase the wages of MetroAccess workers in Hyattsville, MD. Also appearing: Joanna Blotner, Jews United for Justice DC Paid Family and Medical Leave Insurance Campaign Manager, on the 18th annual Labor on the Bimah and the issues highlighted, including Paid Sick Days and Paid Family Leave. Click here for an archive of previous “Your Rights At Work” preview shows. Throughout the metro DC area, Verizon workers are doing their jobs serving customers, while they continue to mobilize to remind the telecom giant that they want a fair contract, reports the Communication Workers, which, along with the Electrical Workers union, represents workers at Verizon. The contract for 39,000 workers expired August 1. Among the recent actions was a picketline by CWA 2336 at the Verizon Fairland Data Center in Silver Spring, Maryland, where about 125 members work, mostly engineers and engineer assistants.
On today’s Labor Calendar, the transit workers’ WMATA-ville at Transdev continues from 10am – 5pm in Hyattsville; At 1pm find out more about your rights on the job on the "Your Rights At Work" call-in radio show here on WPFW 89.3 FM, which I’ll be hosting; And starting at 4:30 this afternoon, drop by the Jews United for Justice DC Office-Warming Party at their new digs on H Street NW; And tonight at 6:30 check out the Fair Transit Forum at the 5th Street Busboys and Poets, where you can join DC transit workers, riders, and their allies for a forum exploring the changing transit landscape in the District. Complete details on our website at dclabor.org; click on calendar. Here’s today’s labor history: On this date in 1897, Polish, Lithuanian and Slovak miners in Pennsylvania, were gunned down by the Lattimer Mine’s sheriff deputies during a peaceful march from Hazelton to Lattimer. Nineteen were killed and more than 50 wounded as some 3,000 miners marched for collective bargaining and civil liberty. The shooters were tried for murder but the jury failed to convict. Today’s labor quote is by President Barack Obama, after signing an executive order on Labor Day that employees of federal contractors must be allowed to earn up to seven days of paid sick leave annually, including paid time off for family care: “"When you make sure everybody gets a fair shot and a fair shake, and you're fighting for decent wages for workers, and making sure they've got decent benefits, when you reward people who are playing by the rules — that's how everybody does better." An encampment dubbed “WMATAville” will materialize this week in front of a Hyattsville garage owned by Transdev, a private subcontractor for MetroAccess, WMATA’s transportation service for transit riders with disabilities. Today through Friday, the Amalgamated Transit Union is urging supporters to drop by for lunch, music, speeches from allies, and more, to help ratchet up the pressure for a settlement of a new contract for the 440 Transdev workers, who belong to ATU Local 1764.
Today’s Labor Calendar is jam-packed, starting with Representative Donna Edwards’ Job Fair at 10 am at the Prince George’s Sports Complex in Landover, Maryland. Then at noon, the teacher’s union hosts “Ten Years after the Deluge: The State of Public Education in New Orleans” at their headquarters on New Jersey Avenue. And at 1p, rally with local transit workers at the WMATA-VILLE they’re setting up on the lawn at the Transdev garage in Hyattsville, where MetroAccess workers are fighting for a fair contract. Go to dclabor.org and click on calendar for complete details. Here’s this week's Labor Quiz: In 1867, Mary Harris "Mother" Jones, who would become a founding member of the Industrial Workers of the World, lost her husband and four young children. How did they die? Was it fire, an automobile accident; Yellow Fever; or were they murdered by Pinkertons? Go to unionist.com a click on Labor Quiz and you could be next week's winner! Here’s today’s labor history: On this date in 1919, more than a thousand Boston police officers struck after 19 union leaders were fired for organizing activities. Massachusetts Governor – and future US President -- Calvin Coolidge announced that none of the strikers would be rehired, mobilized the state police, and recruited an entirely new police force from among unemployed veterans of World War I. In 1924, sixteen striking Filipino sugar workers on the Hawaiian island of Kauai (kah-WAH-i) were killed by police; four police died as well. Many of the surviving strikers were jailed, then deported. And in 1973, United Auto Workers President Leonard Woodcock was named in President Richard Nixon’s infamous “Enemy’s List,” a White House compilation of Americans Nixon regarded as major political opponents. Another dozen union presidents were added later. Today’s labor quote is by former Vice President Walter Mondale: “A president does not have to agree with everything labor days, but whoever wants to lead this nation, if he really wants to be the president of this country, must respect and involve and listen to the workers of America as expressed through their leadership.” |
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