| December
15, 2006
CWA-supported legislation in Michigan establishing
statewide cable TV franchising rules will lead to an
investment of $620 million in high speed Internet services by
AT&T and create 2,000 new jobs, the company has
promised.
The bill, allowing telecom companies to more easily compete
with entrenched cable companies, got final legislative
approval this week and is headed to the desk of Gov. Jennifer
Granholm.
Praising the lobbying efforts of Michigan locals, District
4 Vice President Seth Rosen said: "High speed broadband is
critical not only for jobs but also for economic development
in the state. We had strong support from Gov. Granholm,
who we just helped reelect, working together with AT&T on
an issue that will mean jobs for our members."
He said that CWA will work with the company next year in
pressing for similar legislation in Ohio, Wisconsin and
Illinois.
Michigan follows California, Indiana, Kansas, New Jersey,
North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Virginia so far
in approving measures for statewide cable
franchising. For further information on CWA's campaign
for universal high speed Internet services, go to
http://www.speedmatters.org/.
At a meeting of global unions and world financial
institutions, world union leaders, including CWA President
Larry Cohen, discussed labor's efforts to secure workers'
rights in today's global economy.
The Washington conference brought together leaders from the
newly formed International Trade Union Confederation and labor
federations worldwide, along with top World Bank and
International Monetary Fund officials and analysts.
As part of a panel on the policy and actions of the new
ITUC, Cohen stressed that the principal "promise and hope of
this new global labor movement is that together we will
be fierce in our determination to pursue the link between
political rights and workers' rights, especially the right of
workers to bargain and form unions."
"Given that there are 168 million of us (represented by
ITUC) if we work together there isn't much we can't do. With
this global economy, if we don't work together, we have no
chance," he said.
Cohen noted that real hope in the advancement of workplace
democracy is coming from the newest democracies — Brazil,
South Africa and others — and reminded participants that what
mattered was not the size of unions, but workers' rights.
He noted that the United States is at its lowest point
in 150 years in terms of workers rights. "We're back to less
than 8 percent, and that's what it was before there were any
labor laws at all."
He contrasted the record in the United States with the
experience of Vodafone workers in South Africa. More than
1,000 have organized and are trying to get recognition, and
they will, he said. "There is linkage between workers'
rights and the political movement for democracy," and that's
the work this global labor federation must pursue, he said.
Compare that success with the efforts by Verizon Wireless
workers in the U.S. to get a union voice. Verizon Wireless
workers have been harassed, intimidated and fired to keep the
union out, Cohen said. Vodafone owns 45 percent of Verizon
Wireless.
Cohen serves as president of UNI Telecom, the telecom
division of the worldwide Union Network International.
Newspaper Guild members across the country rallied,
testified and otherwise drew attention Dec. 11 to the crisis
that massive industry job cuts pose to media workers, quality
journalism and democracy itself.
"We're standing outside a building that six years ago had
240 people to put out the news — writers, editors,
photographers and artists," said Brian Bonner, a reporter at
Minnesota's St. Paul Pioneer Press and member of TNG-CWA Local
37002. "Today we have 175 people doing the same jobs that 240
people used to do."
His concerns were echoed throughout the country as
journalists protested the loss of 44,000 news industry jobs in
the last five years, at least 34,000 of them at newspapers
alone.
"News jobs are disappearing everywhere. It's happening in
Pittsburgh, too," said Post-Gazette columnist Brian O'Neil, a
member of TNG-CWA Local 38061. "In the past five years, more
than 40 jobs have disappeared from our newsroom, more than 15
this year alone. The end result is the people of Pittsburgh
have fewer watchdogs looking out for them. Fewer people are
covering your community, your school board, your local
hospital, your government and your favorite teams."
In Dayton, Ohio, members of TNG-CWA Local 34157, rallied
with signs that said, "No News is Bad News" and "Taking a
Stand for Good Journalism." The publisher of the Dayton Daily
News is cutting staff by means of early retirement buyouts
that about 65 workers so far have accepted. Lou Grieco,
president-elect of the local, called for the lost jobs to be
filled.
In Nashville the same day, Guild members joined a
broad coalition of opponents — from country music singers to
consumer and religious groups — fighting further rollbacks in
media ownership rules, the subject of a Federal Communications
Commission hearing.
"We gather in Nashville with a goal — to protect this
country's democracy by ensuring that many independent,
credible voices are heard on our nation's airwaves and in the
press," said Carolyn Tuft, a St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter
and member of TNG-CWA Local 36047. "We must stop the media
conglomerates from stripping the country of more media
outlets, further eroding the check and balance that a strong
free press provides the public and our democracy."
The Nashville hearing was the second the FCC has held on
the current round of rule changes that could allow media
giants to buy up even more newspapers and TV and radio
stations, affecting both jobs and the ability of Americans to
get information from a wide variety of sources.
"What's at stake is the future of local news and
information," TNG-CWA President Linda Foley said. "With the
quality and diversity of local news already threatened by the
domination of media conglomerates, giving these media moguls
more latitude to combine local newspapers and local
broadcast stations will result in less exchange of viewpoints,
less local news, less public discourse and more civic
apathy."
Video clips of the Guild press conference outside the
Nashville hearing are available on YouTube at
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0MozXskrNQ.
More information about the jobs crisis and Guild actions
nationwide on Dec. 11 is available at
http://www.savejournalism.org/.
Although the New York legislature in effect approved
shutting down three Buffalo hospitals this week, CWA health
care workers haven't given up their fight to save the
facilities, which employ nearly 4,000 members of Local
1168.
State lawmakers wrapped up their legislative session Dec.
13 without taking a vote on a state commission plan to close
or restructure a total of nine hospitals throughout the state,
including St. Joseph's, Gates and DeGraff in Buffalo. By
failing to vote to reject the plan, the legislature
automatically adopted it.
However, media reports indicate there is still room for
discussion, and Local President John Klein said union leaders
will continue to meet with legislators as well as incoming
Democratic Gov. Eliot Spitzer to voice concerns over the
impact of the closings on citizens of the region.
Avoiding an actual vote on the closings "was a cowardly
act," by the lawmakers, Klein said, recalling comments he made
to a crowd of thousands of protesters from many unions outside
the statehouse in Albany on the 13th. Legislators "Should
tell us what they would do, so we can remember in November. We
will not forget to cast our ballots."
Two busloads of Local 1168 members made the 5-hour trip
from Buffalo to Albany for the rally. The local has been
demonstrating, writing letters, running print and broadcast
ads and encouraging others in the community to speak out.
While overnight hospital stays are down overall — one of
the commission's rationales for closing facilities —
Klein said Buffalo hospitals were filled to beyond capacity
during severe storms in October. And the emergency rooms,
which would also be closed, are extremely busy. "If this plan
goes through, it's taking three or four ERs offline, and that
could be the difference between life and death," he said.
- "We're back and we're fighting back" was the
message from CWA President Larry Cohen to more than 600
organizers at the AFL-CIO's Organizing Summit.
Watch the video of some of Cohen's remarks from the Summit
at
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=larry+cohen.
- Former CWA Local 4340 Pres. John Ryan will step
down as executive secretary of the Cleveland area North
Shore Federation of Labor to become U.S. Senator-elect
Sherrod Brown's Ohio director.
Brown, a
Democrat, defeated two-term Republican Mike DeWine. Ryan
took a nine-month leave of absence from North Shore this
year to run Brown's campaign.
"I see this as an
opportunity to make a difference throughout the state," Ryan
said, "by leading a progressive cause built around good jobs
and fighting for the middle class. Sherrod will give Ohioans
hope. He has been fantastic on trade and he'll be fantastic
on organizing rights."
A member of Local 4340 for the
past 30 years, Ryan served as its president from 1982 to
1991. He was a founding member of Cleveland Jobs with
Justice and served as its director from 1992-1995. He
recruited Brown to serve on two JwJ Workers' Rights Boards,
assisting workers in their organizing
campaigns.
- As CWA members prepare to join thousands of
union activists at Goodyear tire centers nationwide on
Saturday, the Steelworkers' bargaining team is wrapping up a
week-long solidarity tour to talk to striking workers at the
company's plants across the United
States.
"Our members clearly understand
what's at stake for them, and they demonstrated their
commitment to win this fight," USW Vice President Tom Conway
said.
About 15,000 workers have been on strike at
Goodyear since Oct. 5, fighting to keep plants open and save
jobs, while protecting health care for workers and
retirees.
Saying "their fight is our fight," CWA
President Larry Cohen has called for CWA members and staff
to leaflet customers at 128 stores across the country Dec.
16. To find a targeted store near you go to
http://www.cwa-union.org/action/goodyear.
Cohen
said the strike and the public pressure are rattling
Goodyear, despite its claims that plants are doing fine with
scabs and union members who have crossed picket lines. The
truth, Steelworkers leaders say, is that more than 97
percent of union members remain on strike and replacement
workers are producing little.
- The last time Democrats were in power in
Congress, they passed the Family and Medical Leave Act.
This time they're pledging to make paid sick leave
the law, saying it could be life-changing legislation for
the nearly 50 percent of American workers who have no paid
days off when they're ill.
"It is appalling that no
federal law in the United States guarantees a single day of
paid sick leave to employees, particularly when middle-class
families are trying so hard to make ends meet," said Rep.
Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), who with Sen. Edward Kennedy
(D-Mass.), is sponsoring the Healthy Families
Act.
- The 47,000-member National Postal Mail Handlers
Union returned to the AFL-CIO on Dec. 12, when federation
President John Sweeney presented a charter to the union's
officers.
"The union movement will be
strengthened by the Mail Handlers' decision to rejoin the
AFL-CIO, which will bring together all the major postal
workers' unions and benefit working families nationwide,"
Sweeney said.
Once an independent union, the Mail
Handlers, merged with the Laborers' Union in 1968. The
Laborers left the AFL-CIO in May. The Mail Handlers is the
first union to take advantage of an AFL-CIO decision to
re-issue charters to formerly independent unions, even if
they now belong to larger unions that have disaffiliated.
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