JOINING TOGETHER
Nurses seek to form union at Bangor psychiatric hospital
Maine Public
By Patty Wight
Oct. 26, 2022
Nurses at Northern Light Acadia Hospital in Bangor have filed to unionize with the American Federation of Teachers. According to written release by the Maine AFL-CIO Wednesday, the effort was prompted by nurses concerns about safe staffing levels, recruitment and retention, and a lack of communication and responsiveness from upper management to employee concerns. If successful, Acadia Nurses United would represent more than 100 nurses. The National Labor Relations Board is expected to schedule an election for Acadia nurses in the coming weeks.
Grand Haven BLP approves union agreement
Grand Rapids Business Journal
By Kayleigh Fongers
Oct. 26, 2022
A community-owned electric utility in Grand Haven recently authorized a union contract. The Grand Haven Board of Light and Power (BLP) this week said it approved a new agreement with the Utility Workers Union of America (UWUA) AFL-CIO Local 582. The four-year contract will be effective through June 30, 2026. For the BLP, this marks the first union agreement with the UWUA since the retirement of the J.B. Sims coal-fired power plant in Grand Haven in 2020.
Nurses unionizing at Bangor’s Northern Light Acadia Hospital
Bangor Daily News
By Lia Russell
Oct. 26, 2022
More than 100 nurses at a psychiatric hospital in Bangor announced Wednesday they were unionizing with the country’s second-largest educators’ union. Some 111 registered nurses and nurse practitioners at Northern Light Acadia Hospital announced they had unionized as Acadia Nurses United with the American Federation of Teachers and on Friday filed for an election with the National Labor Relations Board. The American Federation of Teachers, which boasts 1.7 million members across the U.S., also represents 200,000 nurses and other health care professionals as AFT Healthcare.
'Pittsburgh Post-Gazette' journalists go on strike
NPR
By David Folkenflik
Oct. 23, 2022
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette journalists are on strike in the nation's first newspaper strike in decades. The union is demanding the owners reinstate better working conditions and benefits. Journalists at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette walked off the job this past week in solidarity with non-news colleagues and in protest of working without a contract for five years. It's the first newspaper strike in the U.S. in more than two decades. NPR media correspondent David Folkenflik reports there is much more at stake, and he joins us now.
IN THE STATES
What To Know About: The Amendment to Make Illinois Union Friendlier
Chicago Magazine
By Edward Robert Mcclelland
Oct. 24, 2022
“Bruce Rauner had a war on unions,” says Tim Drea, president of the Illinois AFL-CIO. “It was quite the wake-up call. We had also seen in Wisconsin, a progressive state that led the nation in labor, Scott Walker wiped out collective bargaining for public employees.” That was in 2011, and Wisconsin’s governor was able to do so because, unlike private sector workers, public sector employees are not protected by the National Labor Relations Act. Enshrining the right to collective bargaining in the state constitution would prevent an Illinois governor from following Walker’s example. Vote Yes for Workers’ Rights, a PAC formed by the Illinois AFL-CIO to promote the amendment, has raised more than $12 million, including $1 million apiece from LiUNA Chicago Laborers’ District Council and the International Union of Operating Engineers. The PAC has spent $4 million of that on a TV ad featuring a nurse complaining that staffing shortages and longer shifts at his hospital are endangering patients. “When we speak up, we risk being fired,” he says. “But the Workers’ Rights Amendment will protect us when we stand up for our patients.”
LABOR AND ECONOMY
‘The greatest harm I could ever imagine’: Organized labor blasts Fed rate hikes
The Hill
By Tobias Burns
Oct. 26, 2022
Organized labor is expressing anger about continued interest rate hikes from the Federal Reserve, joining a chorus of voices on the left arguing that lower inflation is not worth the pain of recession. “The Federal Reserve is doing the greatest harm I could ever imagine,” Bill Spriggs, chief economist of the AFL-CIO labor union federation, said in an interview. “I consider what they’re doing right now politics, and they are making a political statement about the economy, and they are wrong. Their analysis is flat wrong.”
LABOR AND COMMUNITY
Alabama Power volunteers partner with IBEW on 25th Habitat build
Alabama News Center
By Joseph Allen
Oct. 26, 2022
Construction is underway on the Alabama Power Service Organization (APSO) Magic City Chapter’s 25th Habitat for Humanity home. Volunteers on the project include members of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, who are partnering with the Magic City Chapter, along with volunteers from the APSO chapter at nearby Plant Miller in west Jefferson County.
RETIREMENT SECURITY
Now is the time to get bipartisan retirement reform done (Opinion)
The Hill
By Sens. Ben Cardin (D-MD.) and Rob Portman (R-OHIO)
Oct. 25, 2022
All Americans deserve an opportunity to have a safe and secure retirement. Unfortunately, the pandemic made it harder for those with lower incomes to save and widened the gap between those who have retirement savings and those who do not. A higher percent of U.S. households risk losing their standard of living in retirement now than before COVID-19.