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Today’s Teamster News For September 28, 2016
TEAMSTERS
Teamster women take over Hollywood to demand equal pay from University of California People’s World …Hundreds of Teamster women marched through the streets of Hollywood, Calif. on Friday, Sept 23rd, in support of University of California (UC) Teamsters, local 2010, and their fight for better wages. Teamsters attending the union’s annual women’s conference joined the rally in downtown Hollywood, where they called on the University of California (UC) system to deliver a fair contract…
Southern Glazer’s Wine and Spirits Drivers Stand Up for Their Rights Local 710 …As part of last year’s contract negotiations, the Teamsters Local 710 Bargaining Committee at Southern Glazer’s Wine and Spirits bargained for and secured Joint Labor Management (JLM) meetings. The benefit to workers is paramount — rank and file members and Local 710 representatives now meet quarterly with management to discuss workplace issues…
Gateway School Board OKs unbudgeted bonus for Teamsters after new contract Trib Live …The Gateway School Board on Sept. 20 passed a resolution that would give some employees an immediate $250 bonus. The bonus will be given to Teamsters members who are Gateway employees, including custodians, secretaries, cafeteria workers, maintenance workers and aides, and will cost approximately $52,000, an expenditure that is not part of the district’s budget…
Private Trash Haulers Pollute Low-Income NYC Neighborhoods of Color Streets Blog …Speaking at a press conference this afternoon alongside members of Teamster Local 813 and representatives from other environmental justice groups, Angela Tovar of The Point Community Development Corporation said that 15,000 to 20,000 diesel trucks enter the Hunts Point neighborhood each day, often on local and residential streets…
Council OK’s 5-year contract with Baldwin Borough police Trib Live …After going nearly two years without a new contract, the Baldwin Borough Police Department has a five-year deal that is retroactive to Jan. 1. Council members approved the collective bargaining agreement last week with Teamsters Local Union 205, which represents the police department. Under the agreement, police officers will receive a 3-percent annual raise, retroactive from Jan. 1 to the present…
GLOBAL LABOR & TRADE
State Workers in Argentina on 24-Hour Strike CaribFlame …A 24-hour strike by the Association of State Workers of Argentina, as well as the workers of public hospitals, begins today. The strikers are demanding that the government of Mauricio Macri raise salaries and reinstatement dismissed workers. The strikers are joined by the Education Workers and the Argentinean Teachers Union, as well as the National Union of Teachers of Argentina, who will march to the Ministry of Education…
India: UCIL workers go on indefinite strike Economic Times …Workers of state-run Uranium Corporation of India Ltd (UCIL) have gone on an indefinite strike from today demanding implementation of the wage revision agreement signed between the management and labour unions in March. Of the four recognised labour unions, Singhbhum Uranium Mazdoor Union, Uranium Kamgaar Union and Jadugora Labour Union have resorted to indefinite strike in all the units…
S. Korea: Railway and Subway Workers on Strike Today Business Korea …South Korean railway and subway workers’ unions, including the Korean Railway Workers’ Union and the Seoul Metro Union, go on strike with one another on September 27. This is to join the walkout by the public sector workers’ unions of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions and the Federation of Korean Trade Unions in opposition to the adoption of performance-based pay the South Korean government is currently in pursuit of…
Greek Lawmakers Pass Additional Austerity Measures NY Times …Greek lawmakers approved a new set of austerity measures Tuesday evening, including further trims in pensions and the transfer of major state assets to a new privatization fund to be overseen by the country’s creditors. Earlier in the day, hundreds of workers protested outside Parliament, railing against further pension cuts and describing the planned privatizations as “the biggest sell-off of national wealth in the country’s history”…
Opposition parties question Japan PM over constitutional amendment, TPP Japan Today …Japan’s opposition parties began Tuesday a three-day session of questions to Prime Minster Shinzo Abe over his stated goals of amending the Japanese war-renouncing Constitution and swiftly ratifying the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact. Democratic Party Secretary General and former Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda vowed to “put strict checks on the Abe administration from the perspective of the public”…
EU ministers call for end to TTIP talks Chemical Watch …The French trade minister and Austrian vice-chancellor have called for EU-US trade talks to be halted. Their call to end negotiations on a transatlantic trade and investment partnership (TTIP) came at an informal meeting of trade ministers in Bratislava, Slovakia. Despite the proposed suspension of talks, ministers decided to continue with the dialogue…
Hatch wants TPP and his 12 years, too Politico …Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch still sounds hopeful about TPP’s prospects in the lame-duck session, even after the deal got an expected thrashing during Monday night’s presidential debate. The Utah Republican said Tuesday there’s time to get it done but the White House needs to get serious about meeting his demands on data protection for biological drugs…
STATE & LIVING WAGE BATTLES
Federal judge blocks Illinois’ same-day voter registration program Think Progress …On National Voter Registration Day, a U.S. District Court in Illinois granted a motion blocking the state’s same-day voter registration program. The program has been offered by counties with populations greater than 100,000. Shortly after a pilot version of the program proved to be a success during the 2014 election, a bill making it a permanent feature of the state’s election law was signed by outgoing Gov. Pat Quinn (D)…
State Rep. Larry Clark: right to work is wrong for Kentucky Hazard Herald …Governor Matt Bevin has made it no secret that he favors so-called “right-to-work” legislation for the upcoming session of the Kentucky General Assembly. His Republican colleagues in the House of Representatives echo this support and by all appearances intend to put the issue front and center when the legislature convenes this January…
Kentucky governor still weighing options over Supreme Court ruling on university budget cuts MyCN2 …Gov. Matt Bevin is looking at his options after the Kentucky Supreme Court ruled 5-2 last week that Bevin overstepped his authority in making 4.5 percent unilateral cuts to most public universities. Bevin says that, by law, he and his staff have some time before deciding whether to try to get the Supreme Court revisit the case one more time…
There wasn’t much talk of the minimum wage at debate MarketPlace …In Monday’s presidential debate a lot of ground was covered. But one thing noticeably missing from the discussion? Minimum wage. Trump did not mention it at all, and Clinton mentioned it just once in her opening statement: “We also have to make the economy fairer. That starts with raising the national minimum wage and also guarantee, finally, equal pay for women’s work”…
D.C. Universities And Businesses Propose Bill Requiring 8 Weeks Of Paid Leave WAMU …The usual foes in D.C.’s debate over paid family leave now seem to be on the same page on the basic question of whether providing leave is good public policy. But they still differ on some key details, including how to pay for the initiative. “We are all in agreement that employees should be taken care of, that’s the most important thing,” says Janene Jackson…
U.S. LABOR
3 weeks into strike, nurses union and Allina resume contract talks Post Bulletin …Negotiators for Allina Health and the nurses union resume contract talks today. A federal mediator called negotiators back to the bargaining table last week, but that doesn’t mean the two sides are ready to cut a deal. Both Allina and the Minnesota Nurses Association have been loathe to make the first move in resuming contract negotiations after a 22-hour bargaining session in early September…
Guards Join Striking Prisoners In Alabama BuzzFeed …Striking prisoners at Alabama’s Holman prison say they have been joined by an unlikely ally: their own guards. Guards at the facility did not show up for their shifts at 6pm on Saturday, according to organizers of the national prison strike and audio and video accounts from a contraband cellphone inside the facility…
A Major Union Just Launched A Boycott Against Donald Trump Huffington Post …The union that recently organized workers at Donald Trump’s Las Vegas hotel announced Tuesday that it was launching a formal boycott of the Republican nominee’s properties around the country. The Culinary Workers Union, a powerful player in Nevada politics, said it will be urging people not to stay at Trump hotels, eat at Trump restaurants or play golf at Trump courses until he starts bargaining with the union over a first contract…
Workers at Electrolux Memphis factory vote for union Commercial Appeal …Employees at the Electrolux appliance factory in Memphis voted Tuesday to unionize. By a margin of more than 2 to 1, workers voted for representation by the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, IBEW Local 474 business manager Paul Shaffer said. The vote came about 16 months after another effort failed in May 2015…
UFCW Local 655 members overwhelmingly reject Schnucks proposal, approve strike Labor Tribune …Members of United Food & Commercial Workers Local 655, in a secret ballot vote this evening at the St. Charles Family Arena, overwhelmingly rejected a proposed contract from Schnuck Markets and authorized only the second strike in the union’s history against a food chain. The vote was 250 to accept the contract and 1,934 to reject and strike (89%), Local 655 President David Cook announced…
AFL-CIO delegates challenge NFL to support bakery workers Workday Minnesota …Delegates to the Minnesota AFL-CIO (link is external) convention on Sunday deluged Taste of the NFL social media with messages of support for workers organizing at Franklin Street Bakery in Minneapolis. Their effort prompted Taste of the NFL, a charity event associated with the Super Bowl, to block the messages, which called on the bakery owner to respect workers and their right to organize…
No Justice, No Peeps! Workers Walk Off the Job At Pennsylvania Peeps Factory In These Times …Workers employed by candy manufacturer, Just Born Quality Confections, in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, are on strike over the company’s pension plan proposal. The strike, workers allege, hits the company—which makes Peeps—just as next year’s Easter orders are meant to be made. Workers are represented by the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers Union Local 6…
Report: Immigrant workers may be robbed of wages, forced into bad conditions MPR News …Immigrant and other local workers may be robbed of their wages, forced to work under oppressive conditions and sometimes even treated like virtual slaves. That’s according to the group Advocates for Human Rights, which on Tuesday laid out a plan to address worker exploitation. The report makes a wide range of recommendations…
SOCIAL JUSTICE & OTHER NEWS
‘That’s Called Business, by the Way’ The Atlantic …In 2006, two years before the crash that would destroy the livelihoods of millions of Americans, Donald J. Trump said he “sort of hope[d]” for that eventuality. He stood to make money. Confronted by Hillary Clinton with that comment at Monday’s debate, Trump did nothing to disavow it. To the contrary, he defended it: “That’s called business, by the way,” he condescended…
Trump Claims Stop And Frisk Suppressed Crime In New York, But Crime Rates Are Lower Without It Huffington Post …Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump claimed on Monday that the stop and frisk policy in New York “brought the crime rate way down,” despite the fact that crime went down after the policy ended. A federal judge ruled against stop and frisk in 2013, calling it “a demeaning and humiliating experience” for communities of color and a “policy of indirect racial profiling”…
Donald Trump Is Wrong—Immigrants Don’t Commit More Crimes TIME …No matter how researchers slice the data, though, the numbers show that immigrants commit fewer crimes than native-born Americans. But that’s not good enough for Trump’s followers. They firmly believe immigrants make America less safe. What the anti-immigration crowd needs to understand is that not only are immigrants less likely to commit crimes than native-born Americans, but they also protect us from crime in several ways…
The ‘Welfare Queen’ Is a Lie The Atlantic …The perception of who benefits from a policy is of material consequence to how it is designed. For the past 40 years, U.S. welfare policy has been designed around Reagan’s mythical welfare queen—with very real consequences for actual families in need of support. Though it was Reagan who gave her the most salient identity, the welfare queen emerged from a long and deeply racialized history…
Democrats dig in with shutdown days away Politico …As Congress careens toward a potential government shutdown, Democrats are dragging the funding fight to the brink and hoping to squeeze the GOP. Neither party wants to risk being blamed for a shutdown just weeks before the presidential election. Democrats say any government funding bill must include federal aid to address the water crisis in Flint…