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About Northwest labor press. (Portland , Ore.) 1987-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 16, 2007)
Inside See Page 6 MEETING NO TICES V olume 108 Number 4 F ebruary 16, 2007 P ortland, Oregon Bill Sizemor e is bac k in business Judging by recent initiative filings, Bill Sizemore is back. But if he thinks old methods will fly, he may have to rethink. Some Oregon lawmakers are preparing new laws to clean up the initiative process. sage of Measure 47, a property tax By DON McINTOSH limitation, or in 2000, when he had a Associate Editor record seven initiatives on the ballot. Defying predictions that a 2002 conviction for forgery and fraud would Either way, subsequently, the Size- more operation fell on hard end his run in politics, times. None of his seven staunchly anti-union measures passed in 2000. ballot measure sponsor Union vigilance prevented Bill Sizemore is back in him from qualifying two business. measures in 2002. His Sizemore has so far group Oregon Taxpayers submitted 38 initiative United was legally dis- petitions for the Novem- solved in 2003. Fallout from ber 2008 ballot, many of a successful union lawsuit them different versions appears to have sidelined of the same idea, filed to him in 2004. increase the odds of get- But in 2006, he was back ting a favorable ballot ti- BILL SIZEMORE on the ballot, with an initia- tle. Of those petitions, 29 tive that would have banned are still active, 10 have the use of credit scores in setting insur- been approved for circulation, and at ance premiums. The somewhat in- least five have been sighted on the clipboards of Sizemore’s roving signa- nocuous measure may have been de- signed to rehabilitate his image. It was ture crews. defeated. In the 1990s, Sizemore’s ballot Judging by his latest crop of initia- measure machine was a major force in tive petitions, he’s attempting a come- Oregon politics. His influence is said to have peaked in 1996, with the pas- (Turn to Page 4) Unitus employees say, ‘Show us the love’ Linda Taylor, Linda Staniford and Paula Johns — members of Communications Workers of America Local 7901 — walk an informational picket line at Unitus Community Credit Union in downtown Portland Feb. 9 to draw attention to slow negotiations for a new contract. Approximately 80 employees at four branches have been working under the terms of a contract that expired on Nov. 30. The union decided to go public two days after management proposed gutting all grievance procedures. “It came out of left field,” said CWA President Madelyn Elder, adding that management also has proposed eliminating two floating holidays. Three years ago, employees accepted wage freezes for two years as the company expanded to be more competitive in the market. “The expansion is done. They have this new downtown office building. Now it’s time to recognize their employees, who are the face and voice of this credit union,” Elder said. The union wants supporters to call the credit union and demand they settle a fair contract. The phone number is 503-227-5571, or 1-800-452-0900. Unions team with ... Wal-Mart! in push for national health care Service Employees and Communications Workers of America join the ‘Better Health Care Together’ coalition WASHINGTON, D.C. — Leaders of two big unions — the Communications Workers of America and the Service Employees International Union — joined Wal-Mart and several other Fortune 500 companies on Feb. 7 to launch a new coalition that will push for universal health care by 2012. Members of the coalition, which include AT&T (the nation’s largest union employer), Intel and Kelly Services, and public pol- icy groups such as the left-leaning Center for American Progress and the Howard H. Baker Jr. Center (Baker was chief of staff under President Ronald Reagan), did not disclose or endorse a specific plan. But the group did draw some flak because of its most promi- nent member: Wal-Mart CEO Lee Scott. Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest private employer, has been tar- geted by labor groups for the expensive health care coverage if of- fers employees, skimpy wages, labor-law-breaking mistreatment of workers and the fact that 46 percent of its workers and their fami- lies are in publicly-paid health care programs. And when a reporter asked Scott if Wal-Mart would commit to spending more on health care or covering more of its workers at a lower cost, he said “no.” Scott said he was pleased that 90 percent of Wal-Mart employees qualified for health insurance. “We’re not pleased that 90 percent choose not to take health insurance.” That, and the presence of other unionists, drew criticism from United Food and Commercial Workers International President Joe Hansen, who said Scott’s presence was nothing more than PR- driven public “posturing.” In an announcement released shortly after the coalition’s news conference, Hansen (who served for over a year on a special con- gressionally-created health care panel) said that although the union supports universal health insurance, “It’s not appropriate to take the stage with a company that refuses to remedy its mistreatment of workers, among other irresponsible practices. Wal-Mart is actu- ally decreasing health care coverage to employees and facing the largest gender discrimination case in the history of this country.” UFCW and SEIU are part of the Change to Win labor federa- tion. SEIU and Wal-Mart are the founding members of the new coali- tion dubbed, “Better Health Care Together.” Stern said he and Wal- Mart CEO Scott had met privately to outline the principles of the coalition, “It is time to admit that employer-based health care is dead,” Stern said. “We can’t keep tinkering, hoping that incremental change will fix our broken health care system. We need fundamen- tal change, and it is going to take new thinking, leadership, new partnerships, some risk-taking, and compromising to make it hap- pen. But that is what we all owe our country.” Nearly 47 million Americans lack health insurance, while insur- ance premiums have jumped 87 percent over the last five years. Larry Cohen, president of the Communications Workers of America, explained that he joined the coalition because “Our cur- rent system puts a huge strain on employers that provide quality (Turn to Page 11)
