ORGANIZING
Auburn GE workers launch union campaign
Alabama Political Reporter
By Jacob Holmes
Aug. 23, 2022
Nearly 200 General Electric Aviation workers at the Auburn, Alabama, plant have launched a new union organizing campaign. GE Auburn workers submitted union cards to the Birmingham office of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) Monday and announced that GE workers across the country are taking steps to form unions at their factories as well. Workers announced the GE Auburn organizing campaign with IUE-CWA at a Birmingham event Monday with national and state support, including Alabama AFL-CIO President Bren Riley, and leaders from Alabama Jobs With Justice, and Alabama Interfaith Power and Light.
JOINING TOGETHER
Minnesota nurses’ strike vote puts safety and conditions in spotlight
The Guardian
By Michael Sainato
Aug. 23, 2022
Throughout the Covid pandemic, nurses around the US have faced deteriorating working conditions and challenges, from safety concerns to increasing workloads that have stemmed from understaffing as nurses have quit their jobs or retired early. Those nurses who are still on the job at many hospitals say they have been expected to do more with fewer resources, an issue that nurses say is causing retention crises and jeopardizing patient safety and care. Now nurses at 15 hospitals in the Twin Cities area (Minneapolis-St Paul) and Duluth, Minnesota, that are negotiating new union contracts with their respective hospitals have overwhelmingly voted to authorize a strike. A date for the work stoppage has not been set yet by the union, the Minnesota Nurses Association, which represents about 15,000 nurses who voted on the strike authorization, but a 10-day notice must be given ahead of any strike. If a strike is carried out, it would be one of the largest nurses’ strikes in US history.
Nation’s top union leaders back gay activists at Pride at Work convention
People’s World
By Mark Gruenberg
Aug. 23, 2022
Union leaders Fred Redmond, Randi Weingarten and Sara Nelson hit different themes—electoral activism, right-wing hate and corporate greed, respectively–at the Pride@Work convention in Minneapolis in mid-August. And the meeting, of the AFL-CIO’s constituency group for LGBTQ+ people also featured—what else?—a protest, which delegates eagerly joined in. In this case, though, the protesters were members of Unite Here Local 17, who are campaigning for a contract with the Millennium Hotel, site of the convention. Bosses, as usual, are stonewalling—having reneged on a tentative agreement two months after the hotel booked the convention, So Pride@Work delegates joined the Unite Here members in occupying the hotel lobby for half an hour. Redmond and Schleuss, who attended the whole convention, received Solidarity awards. The convention theme was “Out for Democracy.” Redmond challenged the LGBTQ community not just to get involved in politics, but to seek public office. “Everybody in. Nobody is left out. I dare you, members of @PrideatWork, get involved, run for office and follow the examples of (Bayard) Rustin, (A. Phillip) Randolph and others,” Redmond declared. “Push for the change you want to see in our unions, our communities and our country.
Cedar Rapids, Iowa: Day 22 for striking Ingredion workers
Fight Back! News
Aug. 23, 2022
Over 120 workers from the Ingredion plant in Cedar Rapids, Iowa have been on strike for 22 days after rejecting the bosses “last, best and final offer” on August 1. The striking workers are members of the Bakery, Confectionary, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers union (BCTGM). Ingredion produces starches and sweeteners mostly for industry. The plant was purchased by Ingredion in 2015 and that’s when the union says everything began to go downhill.
Local unions picket construction site of distribution spec building on I-71
WMFD
By Greg Kahl
Aug. 23, 2022
Laborers' Local 1216 organized an informational picket at the site of H&M Construction's 707,940 square foot distribution spec building on I-71 and State Route 61 in Morrow County. Local labor leaders are concerned the 70-75 million dollar project is not using local union building trades, "Quite frankly we think it's a slap in the face to the local workforce here in the North Central Ohio region," said Jeff Sellers of Laborers' Local 1216. He and members of the IBEW, Cement Masons Union, and Plumbers and Pipefitters can provide the skilled work for the large-scale project that is going up in their backyards.
LABOR AND COMMUNITY
‘Equal on the first day’: Women of Steel donate 99 backpacks full of school supplies
The Free Press
By Joshua Fischlin
Aug. 23, 2022
Ninety-nine kids from across the Elk Valley and Crowsnest Pass will be ready to return to school in September thanks to the Women of Steel of USW Local 9346. This year marks the 11th year of the ‘Back to School Backpacks Campaign’, according to Sarah Thompson, co-chair of the Women of Steel committee. The campaign provides backpacks full of needed school supplies to anonymous, underprivileged kids in Fernie, Sparwood, Elkford, and the Crowsnest Pass. This year, just like last year, there will be 99 backpacks delivered. “Our mandate is for kids, everybody to be equal on the first day,” Thompson said.
IN THE STATES
CT essential worker bonuses should be fully funded, Scanlon says
CT Mirror
By Keith M. Phaneuf
Aug. 23, 2022
Ed Hawthorne, president of the Connecticut AFL-CIO, praised Scanlon for recognizing that state officials need to deliver the full grants that were advertised — and not just a portion of them. “There was an invisible virus that was killing people, and these people went into work,” said Hawthorne, whose organization had proposed bonuses of $2,000. “One thousand dollars is the least we can do for them.”
#Activate10: Riverton firefighters plan to ‘Fill the Boot’ for MDA on Saturday
County 10
Aug. 23, 2022
On Saturday, August 27 the Riverton Fire Department (RFD) is holding its annual Fill the Boot program to raise funds for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA). RFD is currently planning to collect donations at Smith’s, Sutherlands, and Murdoch’s from 9 am to 2 pm. For 67 years, the International Association of Firefighters (IAFF) has collected critical funds to help transform the lives of kids and adults with muscular dystrophy, ALS and related muscle-debilitating diseases.