July 14, 2006

Convention Calls for Bold Action to Build Bargaining Power

CWA Convention delegates on July 10 approved the "Ready for the Future" blueprint calling for innovative workplace and political strategies to build the union's bargaining power and achieve four essential goals: job security, quality and affordable health care, retirement security and real bargaining and organizing rights for America workers.

Delegates created a new Strategic Industry Fund to support major campaigns to change employers' anti-union behavior and to impact public policy on issues such as trade and health care.

The Strategic Industry Fund will be earmarked for different industries based on the percentage of member contributions in each at the rate of about $24 million per year. The SIF will be financed by future contributions to CWA's Members Relief Fund, beginning in September 2006. The level of the MRF as of July 11 becomes a floor, and if the fund falls below that level, contributions will revert back to the MRF until it reaches the established floor once again. The MRF will continue to grow through investment income.

CWA President Larry Cohen said "offense, not defense, is the point of the Strategic Industry Fund." The fund "will give us the means for major, long-range action programs to change the terms of engagement with our employers and reshape the economic landscape in which we bargain. This proposal lets us take charge of our future and build our bargaining power in every major industry group," he said.

Delegates also adopted the 10-point Ready for the Future strategic plan to strengthen bargaining power and bolster CWA Triangle programs. Among key provisions:

  • Training an army of stewards and activists 50,000 strong to fight for workers' rights and to build a movement for fundamental change.
     
  • Building a political program to help boost voluntary CWA-COPE contributions by members above $5 million a year and train and deploy thousands of political activists.
     
  • Tapping the potential of as many as 800,000 retirees through a Retire E-Activist network.
     
  • Expanding organizing beyond the current 10 percent commitment by all levels of the union, bolstering local organizing efforts and encouraging multi-local and regional projects.

The Ready for the Future process began 10 months ago when 2005 convention delegates called for a union-wide conversation on ideas for structure, strategies and activities to meet challenges facing CWA and the labor movement today. The program drafted by CWA's Executive Board and adopted this week was the product of input from members, stewards, and local officers throughout every region and sector of the union.

Numerous outside observers — academics, writers, historians and others, including those from other unions — have called CWA's process unique in the labor movement in terms of the opportunity for union-wide democratic involvement.

The full Ready for the Future plan is available at www.cwa-union.org/future.

Resolutions Spotlight Member Fights, Many Issues

In addition to laying out CWA's Ready for the Future strategy and action plan, convention delegates passed resolutions backing fellow members in battles with major media companies and airlines and calling for a broad range of policy initiatives. Resolutions this year call for:

  • Generating broad, grassroots support for universal health coverage by building on the nation's Medicare system.
     
  • Joining the National Coalition for a Cesar E. Chavez National Holiday to ensure that the Chavez's legacy is recognized and celebrated.
     
  • Condemning the Washington Post for its vicious anti-union campaign against its Mailers' union, CWA Local 14201.
     
  • Fully supporting the reauthorization of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 to guarantee that no one is denied the right to vote.
     
  • Demanding fair trade laws that protect workers' jobs in the United States and the rights of workers in other countries.
     
  • Fighting for immigration reform that respects all workers' rights and protects American jobs by reducing or eliminating the H1-B visa program.
     
  • Launching a national "Speed Matters" campaign to insist that the federal government adopt a national broadband policy to bring high-speed internet access to all Americans by 2010.
     
  • Supporting AFA-CWA members at Mesaba Airlines who are fighting their bankrupt employer's attempt to nullify their contract.
     
  • Promoting the formation of new CWA State Councils.
     
  • Standing with the members of NABET-CWA Local 59053 at the National Captioning Institute and demanding that the NLRB address firings and other outrageous anti-union actions by the employer.

Bargaining Begins for 9,200 Flight Attendants at Northwest

Negotiations between AFA-CWA and Northwest Airlines got underway July 11, following the July 6 vote by more than 9,200 Northwest flight attendants for representation by AFA-CWA.

Mollie Reiley, interim Northwest AFA-CWA Master Executive Council president, said the elected Northwest bargaining team has been working non-stop with AFA-CWA negotiators, attorneys and advisers to prepare for meeting with the airline.

Last month, the federal bankruptcy judge gave Northwest permission to void its current collective bargaining agreement with flight attendants if no agreement is reached by July 17. Northwest flight attendants overwhelmingly rejected a post-bankruptcy agreement negotiated by the Professional Flight Attendants Association, which had represented flight attendants prior to the recent election. Northwest is looking for substantial concessions — $195 million — from flight attendants.  

Reiley said "we are going to use creative means and aggressive tactics at the bargaining table" and urged Northwest management to take advantage of the opportunity of new negotiations to reach a consensus deal. "We are working hard for a deal that the flight attendants can ratify."

Bankruptcy Judge Allows Mesaba to Abrogate Contract

Following the July 14 decision by a federal bankruptcy judge allowing Mesaba Airlines to throw out its contract with AFA-CWA members, flight attendants put management on notice that if it imposes drastic wage and benefit cuts, "there will be CHAOS at Mesaba Airlines." CHAOS is AFA-CWA's workplace mobilization and action plan.

Tim Evenson, Mesaba Master Executive Council president, said "we simply will not accept this injustice" and said Mesaba flight attendants would fight for flight attendants across the industry who also are facing the threat of losing their contracts through the bankruptcy process. 

Mesaba management is demanding wage and benefit cuts of 19.4 percent for six years; some flight attendants would earn less than $10,000 a year after paying for insurance benefits for full-time work.

CWA convention delegates this week voted support for the 450 Mesaba flight attendants in their contract fight.

New Jersey State Workers Win Funding for Pensions

CWA-represented New Jersey state workers won a double victory on July 6 when lawmakers struck a deal with Gov. John Corzine (D) to pass his $31 billion budget and end a shutdown of state services.

First, the governor announced that 45,000 state workers who had been furloughed since July 1 would be paid as if they had worked. Second, the budget contains $1.1 billion for payment into the workers' pension plan, making a good start on the governor's promise to fully fund pensions. The plan has faced a $12.1 billion shortfall since 1994 when Republican Gov. Christie Whitman raided pension funds to pay for a tax cut for the wealthy.

Corzine ordered a shutdown of the state government at the beginning of the month and furloughed all non-essential state employees because there was no money to pay them. By state law, no funds can be expended after July 1 if there is not a balanced budget in place.

The deal struck between Corzine and lawmakers, ending the shutdown, approved both the budget and a 1-cent-on-the-dollar sales tax hike. It mandates that about $600 million will go toward property tax relief. The rest will go into the general fund, including the $1.1 billion for pensions.

CWA District 1 Vice President Chris Shelton praised the governor's decision to pay the furloughed workers, but said the victory came, "because our locals in New Jersey had thousands of people at the state house every day of the shutdown."

New Jersey locals have conducted an ongoing mobilization for full funding of the Public Employee Retirement System and other public worker pension plans.

NLRB Cases Put Millions at Risk of Losing Union Rights

Union members turned out in force across the country this week to draw attention to three pending National Labor Relations Board cases that could leave millions of workers without union rights by redefining who can be labeled a "supervisor" in a workplace.

In Washington, D.C., area CWA members were among hundreds of union activists who rallied Thursday in front of NLRB headquarters. Rallies also took place this week in Nashville, Portland, Ore., Phoenix, Chicago, Milwaukee, Albuquerque and other locations.

The NLRB cases, known collectively as the "Kentucky River" cases, began with groups of nurses trying to organize in Kentucky. Management has tried to claim they are supervisors and therefore ineligible for union rights.

In 2001, the Supreme Court sent their case back to the NLRB, telling the board to clarify which workers should be considered supervisors. The board, with its anti-labor majority appointed by President Bush, could issue a ruling this summer. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other employer groups are eagerly anticipating a victory for their side.

The Economic Policy Institute, in a new report titled, "Supervisor in Name Only," has identified 35 occupations in each of which 50,000 workers or more could lose their union rights. Totaling more than 8 million workers across the country, they include 843,000 registered nurses, 152,000 electricians, 77,000 mechanics and 70,000 pharmacists.

"Skilled and experienced workers such as registered nurses, who give instructions to co-workers about how and when to perform certain tasks, are particularly vulnerable to reclassification as supervisors under this push for a broader reinterpretation of the term," EPI says. "For example, nurses who tell orderlies or nurse aides to do certain things for particular patients are at high risk of reclassification, as are journeymen construction workers who guide other workers on a crew."

Despite requests from unions, the NLRB has refused to hear oral arguments on the cases. At a protest in Nashville, AFL-CIO Organizing Director Steward Acuff said it is "outrageous that the NLRB would consider deciding to disenfranchise millions of people and not hear from the workers most affected."

The Washington, D.C., rally drew a crowd that included NLRB member Wilma Liebman, one of two Democrats on the five-member board.

For more details about the cases and rallies, go to http://www.alfcio.org/.  To read the EPI report, go to http://www.epinet.org/.

IN BRIEF:

  • In a victory for CWA and IBEW and allied groups, the FCC this week attached specific conditions to the sale of bankrupt Adelphia cable, telling purchasers Comcast and Time Warner they can't deny access to "must have" regional sports networks to competitors, including telecom companies now entering the video market.

    Any disputes over pricing or access to the popular sports programming now will go to arbitration, according to the ruling.  Prior to the FCC action, only satellite companies were guaranteed access to regional sports networks.

     
  • Workers who are treated like a dog by their bosses — and we don't mean those happily pampered pooches — may be inspired to break loose from their chains once they see CWA's amusing and persuasive new online video.

    "Chained to my PC" shows a pup as customer service rep, stuck at his call center keyboard, sadly raising his little paw over and over for a bathroom break, but being ignored. CWA's message: You deserve dignity at work. Join us.

    The video, available at http://www.chainedtomypc.com/, originated with a British union that is letting CWA use it to help organize customer service representatives. The website answers organizing questions and provides a link to CWA's website. CWA activists are urged to e-mail the link to members and potential members.

     
  • Imagine dining out with rich relatives who stick you with the bill. Now imagine that it's trillions of dollars and, one way or another, you and your great-great-great grandchildren will be paying it off for the rest of your lives.

    That about sums up the situation with the Bush tax cuts for the rich, as described in a new report by Citizens for Tax Justice.

    Even though middle-income citizens have received about $1,855 per family member in tax cuts over the past five years, the same family's share of the national debt — that is financing the tax cuts — has climbed to nearly $9,000 per person. Put another way, CTJ says that for every $1 in tax cuts you've received, you're holding a bill for $3.74. Read and download the report at http://www.ctj.org/.

     
  • Everything you ever wanted to know about the federal minimum wage is available online in an Economic Policy Institute "Issue Guide" packed with charts, tables and economists' analyses.

    Tables, for instance, show the real value of the minimum wage from 1950 to 2006 and how the minimum stacks up against average wages over the same period.

    Among the reports included, is an analysis showing how the buying power of the $5.15 hourly minimum wage is at a 51-year low. Republican leaders in Congress have killed attempts to raise the wage over the past nine years, during which time lawmakers have voted to inflate their own annual salaries by more than $30,000. The guide can be downloaded at http://www.epinet.org/.