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Today’s Teamster News For June 10, 2016
TEAMSTERS
Teamsters’ Leafletting Campaign Takes Port Misclassification Fight National We Party Patriots …Members of the Teamsters union, in their constant battle to end truck driver misclassification, are taking part in a national leafletting action at XPO/Con-Way terminals. The action coincides with recent strikes at the Port of Los Angeles/Long Beach and in San Diego, where misclassification is rampant. Earlier this month, the Teamsters called on the Port of Los Angeles/Long Beach to ban trucking companies who misclassify employees…
Mineral County sheriff’s workers end strike Great Falls Tribune …Striking employees of the Mineral County sheriff’s department have returned to work now that a mediation session is scheduled. Teamsters Local 2 spokesman Shawn Fontaine tells KGVO-AM that the deputies, dispatchers and detention officers went back to work Thursday morning. The mediation session is scheduled for June 15…
US Foods and one of two Teamsters locals in Severn reach agreement over warehouse closure Baltimore Sun … Foods and the Teamsters local representing striking warehouse workers at a Severn distribution center have reached an agreement over the planned closure of the facility, the company said Thursday. Members of Local 570 of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters ratified the agreement Wednesday night, the company said in a statement…
Hartford Distributors locks out 120 Teamsters during contract talks Journal Inquirer …Representatives of Teamsters Local 1035 and Hartford Distributors Inc. were to meet with a federal meditator today, a day after the company locked out union members over contract negotiations. “There was no need for this lockout,” Christopher Roos, principal officer of Local 1035, said today, adding many of the 120 workers have been at HDI for 30 to 35 years…
The 24-hour Factory Strike at Sandoz is Now a Lockout Edmonton Journal …The 24-hour strike at the Sandoz pharmaceutical factory is now a lockout. The employer turned away workers who showed up this morning for a 7-hour shift. This irresponsible pressure tactic could eventually disrupt the supply of medications to hospitals. “A 24-hour strike is one thing, an indefinite lockout is another,” said Jean-François Pelletier, a Business Agent with Teamsters Canada Local Union 1999…
Teamsters union, Correia administration complete informal hearing with labor board Wicked Local …The informal hearing with the Department of Labor Relations between the city and the sanitation workers’ Teamsters Local 251 is complete, and both sides are now awaiting a decision on whether their cross-accusations of unfair labor practices will move to the next phase. City Administrator Cathy Ann Viveiros was one of the administration’s representatives at the hearing in Boston on Wednesday…
Local 727 Bargaining Committee Gives Osco Management Last, Best, Final Offer Local 727 …Osco management opened the third day of federal mediation with the Teamsters Local 727 Bargaining Committee by promising to provide a complete, comprehensive offer. After seven hours, however, the company still had not provided such an offer, so instead, the Local 727 Bargaining Committee gave Osco management its last, best and final offer. “We had to take action because the company would not,” said John T. Coli, Secretary-Treasurer of Local 727…
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
Argentine Workers Shut Down Airports in 2-Day Strike for Wages TeleSUR …Argentina is set to see a shutdown in airplane traffic for the next two days as state workers in the national aviation union launched a 48-hour strike on Friday morning across more than 30 airports to pressure the government to negotiate a wage dispute with workers, hard hit by rising inflation. Airport workers, organized through the national Association of State Workers, announced the work stoppage on Thursday…
Union head: Canadian auto workers will strike if needed Detroit News …The fate of the Canadian auto industry and its tens of thousands of jobs is at stake this summer as Unifor enters contract negotiations with the Detroit automakers, according to union leader Jerry Dias. Unlike its United Auto Workers counterpart in the United States, Unifor’s main issue during the negotiations won’t be increasing wages, it will be keeping plants open…
Seafood Is a Dirtier Business Than You Think The Nation …The catch of the day you ordered for dinner journeyed an unfathomably long way to your table: Your shellfish might have been netted on the Indian ocean, but the workers who hauled it ashore were trafficked from impoverished Southeast Asian villages onto black-market fishing vessels off the Thai coast….
Odds of U.S. TPP ratification ’50/50:’ David Dodge BNN …Former Bank of Canada Governor David Dodge thinks the odds of the United States ratifying the Trans-Pacific Partnership before President Barack Obama leaves office are no better than a coin flip. Dodge said those odds deteriorate further after the next U.S. president takes office.“Our best guess is that it’s a 50/50 chance that TPP will get approved during the lame-duck period in the United States,” he said…
Sanders forces push trade opposition at DNC platform meeting The Hill …Trade policy is emerging as a point of tension between the Bernie Sanders team and the party establishment in the drafting of the Democratic Party platform. While Hillary Clinton came out against the Obama administration’s Trans-Pacific Partnership, an Asian trade deal that she previously championed as secretary of State, the Sanders forces still doubt the sincerity of her opposition to the agreement…
Regulation of Financial Industry is History if Trade In Services Agreement Passes Counterpunch …The most secret of the international “free trade” agreements being negotiated around the world is the Trade In Services Agreement, which also might be the most draconian yet. If TISA were to go into effect, regulation of the financial industry would be effectively prohibited, privatizations would be accelerated and social security systems would potentially be at risk of privatization…
Coalition Pushes for TTIP to Cover Financial Services Bloomberg …U.S. opposition to language on financial services regulatory cooperation in the pending trans-Atlantic trade deal could be challenged by a new coalition of 14 European and U.S. industry and business associations. U.S. officials have argued that discussions on financial services regulatory cooperation should take place in other international fora apart from the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)…
Poorer children disproportionately affected by austerity measures, says UN The Guardian …Austerity policies and and welfare cuts are causing poverty and inequality, according to a damning United Nations (UN) investigation into children’s rights in the UK. The UN committee on the rights of the child said it was “seriously concerned” about the disproportionate impact on poorer children of a range of government policies…
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
California voters to consider corporate money in politics SacBee …California voters will offer their opinions this fall on what role corporate donations should play in political campaigns. Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday allowed the non-binding measure to go on the statewide November ballot without his signature. SB254 will ask voters if California’s elected officials should push to amend the U.S. Constitution to overturn a 2010 U.S. Supreme Court decision known as Citizens United…
Poll finds Californians are strongly in favor of state’s minimum wage increase LA Times …Californians strongly back the state’s minimum wage increase to $15 — the highest in the country — even though they believe the wage hike will hurt their pocketbooks and the state’s economy, according to a new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll. Almost two-thirds of the state’s registered voters surveyed in the poll agreed with the phased-in wage increase, which Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law in April…
Florida Supreme Court rejects another part of workers-comp system Orlando Sentinel …For the second time in less than two months, the Florida Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that part of the state’s workers’ compensation insurance system is unconstitutional. Justices, in a 5-2 decision, ruled in favor of Bradley Westphal, a St. Petersburg firefighter who suffered a severe back injury while on the job in 2009. The case focused on a workers’ compensation law that led to Westphal’s benefits being cut off after two years…
21 States Suing Delaware Over Abandoned Money Orders AP …Twenty-one states on Thursday sought more than $150 million in uncashed money orders from Delaware, where more than 1 million businesses take advantage of friendly incorporating laws and unclaimed financial property is a major source of state revenue. A lawsuit filed directly to the U.S. Supreme Court is another escalation in an ongoing dispute involving uncashed money orders…
Lawsuit Takes Aim At Tennessee’s Anti-LGBT Counseling Law Think Progress …Tennessee lawmakers may have failed to advance an anti-transgender bill that mirrored North Carolina’s HB2, but they did pass a bill enabling religious-based discrimination in counseling. Now, a lawsuit is taking aim at that law and the way it could be used to refuse treatment to the LGBT community…
U.S. LABOR
Trucking Company Fired Driver For Refusing To Violate Safety Regulations DOL …A truck driver concerned he couldn’t complete his delivery from Massachusetts to New Jersey and back without violating federal safety regulations and putting himself and others at risk thought he’d devised a solution to deliver his cargo on-time and comply with the regulations. Instead of thanking him, his employer fired him. In so doing, NFI Interactive Logistics Inc. violated the anti-retaliation provisions of the Surface Transportation Assistance Act…
SEIU Local 1000 rallies at California Capitol for 22 percent raise SacBee …Clad in purple, thousands of state employees partied with a purpose at the Capitol on Wednesday, hoping to prod Gov. Jerry Brown to accept their union’s contract proposal that, among other things, would raise their pay 22 percent. “This is not going to be easy,” Local 1000 President Yvonne Walker told the crowd gathered on the Capitol’s west lawn. “But there’s no quit in Local 1000”…
AT&T Mobility, CWA Avoid Repeat Of Verizon Strike Channel Partners …AT&T Mobility and the Communications Workers of America have averted a potential nationwide strike of more than 40,000 employees by reaching a tentative agreement. The agreement focuses on benefits, including health care, and will be submitted to the union’s membership for a ratification vote, the carrier said. Wages, pension and work rules for union-represented mobility employees are negotiated under separate contracts…
Flint will require contractors to pay union wage to workers removing pipes Michigan Radio …Flint city officials will require contractors pay a prevailing wage to workers who replace the city’s lead service lines. Though for a time, that wasn’t going to be the case. Next week, the city of Flint will receive bids on a project to remove up to 500 lead service lines. When the formal request for proposals went out earlier this month, it contained a provision that workers would receive standard union wages…
Dozens fired at St. Paul charter school in suspected union retaliation City Pages …Staff were investigated for whistleblowing, and sudden terminations abounded. In September 2014, teachers and staff unionized to bargain for a fair discipline process to precede surprise firings. Shortly after unionizing, three Hmong office staff were fired. The National Labor Relations Board had to intervene and warn the school against punishing union activity…
People of color will be a majority of the American working class in 2032 EPI …People of color will become a majority of the American working class in 2032. This estimate, based on long-term labor force projections from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and trends in college completion by race and ethnicity, is 11 years sooner than the Census Bureau projection for the overall U.S. population…
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
U.S. economic outlook brightens on upbeat job, inventory data Reuters …The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits unexpectedly fell last week, pointing to sustained strength in the labor market despite a sharp slowdown in hiring last month. Other data on Thursday showed wholesale inventories recording their biggest increase in 10 months in April, prompting economists to raise their second-quarter economic growth estimates…
Hypocrite Trump To Hold New Hampshire Fundraiser With Know Job Outsourcer NH Labor News …Donald Trump says he is going to “make America great again” by magically bringing jobs back to the United States and opposes companies who offshored jobs. But in New Hampshire, Trump is planning to attend a fundraiser with Bill Binnie who made an untold amount of money selling out American workers…
Exclusive: Hundreds allege Donald Trump doesn’t pay his bills USA Today …At least 60 lawsuits, along with hundreds of liens, judgments, and other government filings reviewed by the USA Today Network, document people who have accused Trump and his businesses of failing to pay them for their work. Among them: a dishwasher in Florida. A glass company in New Jersey. A carpet company. A plumber. Painters…
Donald Trump’s Racism Actually Makes It Impossible For Him To Get The Working-Class Vote Huffington Post …The American working class is becoming a lot less white, a new analysis reveals — yet more evidence that the racist underpinnings of Donald Trump‘s campaign are not just morally abhorrent but, frankly, illogical. The reality TV star’s unabashed use of racism in his campaign is alienating a huge swath of working people and pitting lower-income Americans against each other…
Elizabeth Warren Rips Into Paul Ryan’s Anti-Poverty Plan Mother Jones …On Tuesday, Paul Ryan unveiled a new anti-poverty plan in Washington, DC. Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren took to Facebook later in the day to tear apart Ryan’s plan as a retread of old Republican proposals. “It looks more like an agenda for creating poverty than reducing it,” Warren wrote…
Paul Ryan’s plan to fight poverty would keep millions in poverty (opinion) Medium …This week, Speaker of the House Paul Ryan unveiled the first in a series of policy papers detailing the House Republican agenda ahead of the November elections. While the proposal is admirable in its stated aim to lift millions of people out of poverty, the plan falls far short on meaningful solutions and entirely misses the mark on what the paper calls the “root causes of poverty”…