Labor Union Blog

It’s Saturday, Oct. 27, 2007, and the second to last door-to-door walk in Virginia is in full-force. Mother Nature showed at least parts of the state her pro-labor bias by giving us a break from the rain and even letting the sunshine through just as volunteers reached their neighborhood destinations to knock on union household doors.

Communications Workers of America (CWA) Vice President Barbara Easterling, Virginia AFL-CIO Secretary-Treasurer Doris Crouse-Mays, AFL-CIO Political Director Karen Ackerman and Northern Virginia Central Labor Council President Dan Duncan welcomed the slightly damp, but stalwart volunteers ready to hit the streets.

WIN Week In Review October 26-27, 2007

By Doug Cunningham

After strong dissent that say UAW locals representing a third of its Chrysler membership rejecting the tentative concessionary contract with Chrysler, it now looks more likely that the agreement will be approved as votes are tallied this weekend. But Bill Parker, the UAW’s Chrysler national negotiating Committee Chair, says the deal at Chrysler and it’s lower wages for new hires is a step back for the union.

[Parker 1]: “The UAW has in many ways embodied the gains of the New Deal and industrial unionism from the ’30′s forward. And now in many ways we’re retreating from that. And I don’t see abandoning what industrial unionism and the New Deal has meant for progress in the United States.”

Phone banking is a key to union members’ get-out-the-vote efforts in Kentucky.

AFL-CIO representative Joseph Holland has been working in Kentucky with union members to help get out the vote for the state’s critical gubernatorial elections. Steve Beshear (D) is challenging Gov. Ernie Fletcher (R), who has canceled bargaining rights for state employees, privatized Kentucky’s Medicaid program and taken other anti-worker stands.

Steve Beshear visited our Labor 2007 member-to-member phone bank in Louisville Thursday evening. Our UAW Local 862 phone bank was full, with more than 50 union members from six different International Unions.

Here are some quotes from our hardworking volunteers upon meeting and phone banking with Beshear.

Rob Tanner, Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 369 Business Rep:

It was a pleasant surprise to see him come through. Nice to shake hands with the next governor. We are going to see a governor that will stand with us on our issues. It’s time someone did.

Bus drivers for First Student of Maine recently voted to form a union with AFSCME Council 93.

For the second time in two months, employees of First Student Inc. have gained a voice on the job by choosing AFSCME to represent them. This week, some 50 First Student bus drivers in Augusta, Maine, voted to join Council 93, according to the “Across The Nation” section on the AFSCME website.