ORGANIZING
Landslide Vote Grants Collective Bargaining To FCPS Staff, Educators
Patch
By Michael O'Connell
June 10, 2024
Nearly 97 percent of instructional staff and more than 80 percent of operational staff at Fairfax County Public Schools voted to allow Fairfax Education Unions to represent and collectively bargain for nearly 27,000 public school employees. Fairfax Education Association and the Fairfax Federation of Teachers teamed up for the "YES for FEU campaign" to have the right to collectively bargain in order to guarantee staffing for full-service public schools.
Public Theater Company Workers Vote to Join IATSE
Playbill
By Molly Higgins and Logan Culwell-Block
June 10, 2024
Production workers at Off-Broadway's Public Theater have officially voted to unionize and join IATSE. Of the company's workers, 70 percent voted, with 178 for and 11 against. The decision follows a growing trend of Off-Broadway companies voting to unionize, including Atlantic Theater Company and Titaníque earlier this year. Off-Broadway theatre backstage workers are currently largely non-union, unlike their Broadway counterparts. The Public declined to voluntary recognize the backstage workers' union in March, prompting the decision to call for a vote.
Fulton Electric Department joins IBEW 1439
Labor Tribune
By Staff
June 10, 2024
In another win for Organized Labor, employees of the city of Fulton Electric Department have unanimously voted to join IBEW Local 1439. “We would like to congratulate and welcome the 14 brothers and sisters of the city of Fulton Electric Department to IBEW Local 1439,” said Jeremy Pour, Local 1439 business manager. IBEW Local 1439, which represents about 810 members, has been representing outside physical workers in the utility industry since March 16, 1945, including distribution and transmission linework outside of power plants, substation maintenance and construction, building service, meter department, meter reading, underground, trouble, stores, utility shop and salvage, gas, and motor transportation employees. The local also represents workers in multiple municipalities, including Desoto and Potosi.
Technical staff in Nevada state government file for union election
State Scoop
By Colin Wood
June 10, 2024
Technical employees of the Nevada state government last Thursday filed for a union election that could make the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees their representative for contract negotiations this fall. According to the labor union, the state’s technical workers, one of 11 bargaining units, includes DMV services techs, family support specialists at the state’s welfare services department, transportation engineering techs and library techs, among others. The push follows a requirement that workers file for exclusive representation based on their job classifications.
Thousands Of Virginia Public School Teachers And Staff Vote To Unionize
HuffPost
By Dave Jamieson
June 10, 2024
Public school employees in one of the biggest school districts in the U.S. have voted overwhelmingly to form unions, capitalizing on a recent Virginia law that allows for collective bargaining in the public sector. The two votes in the Washington, D.C., suburb of Fairfax County covered more than 27,000 workers, putting them among the largest union elections in recent years. The county’s teachers voted nearly 97% in favor of unionizing, while the operations staff, which includes custodians, food workers and bus drivers, voted nearly 81% in favor.
UMMC health care workers will vote whether to form first resident physician union in Maryland
WBALTV 11
By Tommie Clark
June 10, 2024
A vote will determine whether residents and fellows can begin bargaining for new contracts at University of Maryland Medical Center. Hospital workers unionizing has become a trend across the country. Years of organizing efforts will come down to this week's vote. The vote will determine the viability of the University of Maryland Resident and Fellow Alliance, organized under AFT-Maryland, which represents a number of health professionals across the state. "To be able to voice their concerns, to talk about the pay, to talk about some other inequities that are happening on the job. So, all I can say is, basically, the time is ripe. Folks across the country want a union," AFT Maryland president Kenya Campbell said.
Kratom workers across eastern Missouri vote to unionize
STLPR
By Rebecca Rivas
June 10, 2024
CBD Kratom employees have become the first Missouri workers in the industry to unionize, following a Friday election. The election spanned across 17 stores in eastern Missouri and Illinois operated by the St. Louis-based CBD Kratom, which sells largely kratom and hemp-derived THC products. Employees voted 23 to 6 to unionize, with 75% of the eligible employees participating. “I’m so excited and so proud of everyone,” said Taylor Moore, sales associate. “I’m encouraged to know that our voices as workers are and will be heard.” Sales associate Nina Sykes said, “This opens the doors for CBD Kratom employees to be more successful in their role.” The employees join more than 15,000 cannabis industry workers nationwide as members of the United Food and Commercial Workers International Union. Of the 17 locations that voted to organize, 14 are located in St. Louis and will be represented by UFCW Local 655. The remaining 3 in Illinois will be represented by UFCW Local 881.
JOINING TOGETHER
UAW reaches tentative deal with GM's joint venture battery plant in Ohio
Detroit Free Press
By Jamie L. LaReau
June 10, 2024
The UAW has reached a tentative local agreement with the factory in northeast Ohio that supplies battery cells for General Motors electric vehicles. The workforce at Ultium Cells, which is a joint-venture between GM and South Korea-based battery company LG Energy Solution, voted to unionize in December 2022, just five months after the facility started production. The tentative agreement will give most workers there a $3.59 per hour raise upon ratification, according to letter by UAW President Shawn Fain posted on www.uaw.org/Ultium.
Penn RAs get first union contract
The Philadelphia Inquirer
By Ariana Perez-Castells
June 10, 2024
Residence hall assistants at the University of Pennsylvania have ratified their first union contract with increased benefits and pay. The group became the first RA union in the Philadelphia area in September when it joined the Office and Professional Employees International Union Local 153. “This is the first student worker contract in the history of the University of Pennsylvania. [It] builds a strong foundation for fair pay and respect and transparency and support for student workers at Penn,” Scott Williams, a lead organizer with OPEIU Local 153, said in an interview Monday.
Cooper Tire union contract talks expected to resume June 11
KSLA
By Fred Gamble
June 10, 2024
Union employees at Cooper Tire & Rubber Co. in Texarkana could be seen going to and from work Monday morning (June 10) as usual with one exception: They’re working without a contract. For the past two months, representatives of United Steel Workers Union 752L have negotiated with the company for a new work contract. The 1,500 union workers at the plant were working under a five-year contract that expired Friday (June 7). “We are not very close at all,” union local President Kerry Halter said.
IATSE Labor Negotiations to Resume June 24
The Hollywood Reporter
By Katie Kilkenny
June 10, 2024
Labor negotiations covering tens of thousands of members of IATSE who work under two separate contracts are set to resume on June 24, the crew union announced on Monday. The union and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers have agreed to meet for four bargaining sessions between June 24 and 27, IATSE added in a statement to its members. Those discussions will cover both the Basic Agreement (a contract spanning 13 West Coast Locals and approximately 50,000 crew members) and the Area Standards Agreement (which encompasses 23 Locals and about 20,000 workers).
STATE LEGISLATION
Illinois General Assembly passed numerous pro-worker bills this session
Labor Tribune
By Staff
June 10, 2024
The Illinois General Assembly wrapped up the 2024 spring session on Wednesday, May 29, sending many pro-worker bills to the Governor’s desk. Among the biggest victories of the session: ‘CAPTIVE AUDIENCE’ MEETINGS
The Illinois Worker Freedom of Speech Act passed the General Assembly on a bipartisan roll call. SB 3649 protects employees if they opt out of employer-sponsored meetings on religious or political matters, including union organizing. Captive audience meetings are one of the most powerful union-busting tools in employers’ toolkit. This legislation carried by Senator Robert Peters (D-Chicago) and Leader Marcus C. Evans Jr. (D-Chicago) gives employees protection if they choose to disengage.
LABOR AND COMMUNITY
Iron Workers Local 396 celebrates 100th anniversary in style
Labor Tribune
By Ed Finkelstein
June 10, 2024
Iron Workers Local 396 celebrated its 100th Anniversary (1924-2024) on May 18 with a day-long, family-friendly, free event at the union hall that matched the pride of the union’s members and officers, Business Manager/Financial Secretary-Treasurer Mike Heibeck reports. Everyone received mementos of the milestone event including a commissioned artwork poster highlighting the union’s memorable projects, t-shirt, decals and a special 100th anniversary pin with the union’s logo under their iconic project, the Gateway Arch.
WORKPLACE SAFETY AND HEALTH
IBEW Local 649 hosts solar array safety training for first responders
Labor Tribune
By Elizabeth Donald
June 10, 2024
Fire fighters and other first responders need to take special precautions when disaster strikes a building with solar panels, as they learned in union-sponsored training last week. The trainer was Robert Hattier, executive director of the Illinois IBEW Renewable Energy Fund and renewable energy director for IBEW Local 134. Hattier was invited to share the safety training by IBEW Local 649 in Alton, as he has been working with solar power for 20 years and knows the unique hazards solar power presents for first responders. Some of the major hazards fire fighters might face in a solar-powered building include inhalation exposure, electrical shock and burns, falls from roof operations, roof collapse, chemical spills from solar batteries, and the potential for reignition.
CIVIL, HUMAN, AND WOMEN’S RIGHTS
James Lawson, an architect of civil rights nonviolence, dies at 95
The Washington Post
By Paul W. Valentine
June 10, 2024
The Rev. James M. Lawson, a United Methodist minister who became a principal tactician of nonviolent protest during the civil rights movement, leading sit-ins, marches and Freedom Rides that withstood attacks by mobs and police throughout the 1960s, died June 9. He was 95.
The Rev. James Lawson, key architect of the Civil Rights Movement, dies at 95
WFDD
By Debbie Elliott
June 10, 2024
The Rev. James Lawson was a staunch advocate for nonviolent resistance to racism, even in the face of brutality. A Methodist minister and student of Gandhi, Lawson mentored civil rights leaders, and was the tactician behind key desegregation campaigns in the South, including the Nashville Sit-Ins, the Freedom Rides, and the Birmingham Children’s Crusade. The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. called him the leading theorist and strategist of nonviolence.
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